Journal of Housing and the Built Environment最新文献

Shared housing is a rather unusual phenomenon in Sweden. However, due to the decreasing availability of affordable housing and a large share of single-person households in urban areas, sharing is on the rise and new forms of shared housing have entered the market. By analysing how shared housing overlaps with existing patterns of socioeconomic segregation and by interviewing developers of diverse forms of shared housing in the cities of Stockholm and Malmö, this article aims to evolve the understanding of sharing housing from a perspective on housing inequality. We find that while many households are sharing housing because there are no other options, others share because they have the possibility to share certain spaces and facilities, which makes life easier and enhances a sense of togetherness. While the first category is concentrated in marginalized and racialized areas of the cities, the other category is concentrated in well-off areas. Developers offering shared solutions in marginalized areas are few but do so based on a discourse of ‘receiving less for more’, while developers offering shared housing in wealthier districts are doing so based on ‘sustainability’ and ‘making life easier’, as the shared housing includes private facilities and services that aim to support an effortless lifestyle in districts with existing urban assets. The conclusion is that sharing housing is no longer solely built on community spirit and de-growth, but sharing housing is also a reflection of contemporary housing inequality.

Residential communities, especially those in urban areas, face significant challenges due to rapid urban growth. Due to society’s continual shift toward a personalized, anonymous, and mobile one, one of these challenges is the disappearance of close-knit communities of family and friends. Neighborhoods nowadays are therefore multipurpose systems for creating localized social ties and networks. In light of the significance of social ties, this study investigates the relationship between localized social ties and residential satisfaction via the mediation of a sense of place. This study therefore has three main objectives: 1) to determine the relationship between localized social ties (LST) and residential satisfaction (RS); 2) to examine the relationship between LST and sense of place (SOP); and 3) to investigate the mediating role of SOP between LST and RS. To collect data for the study, self-filling paper questionnaires were distributed by door-to-door visits. The collected data from Rezvan complex residents in Shiraz, Iran (n = 400) were used then for analysis using a causal model. The causal model adopted revealed appropriate goodness of fit. The sense of place and residential satisfaction were positively related to localized social ties. We also found that SOP mediates the relationship between localized social ties and residential satisfaction.

Green spaces are an important element of the spatial structure in large prefabricated housing estates. They have their strengths and weaknesses and generate a number of opportunities and threats, the identification of which allows the potential of these areas to be realised and further developed. The goal of the study is to present the general condition and future of green spaces in large prefabricated housing estates in Poland. It is important to note that to date no research works have been published in the literature that would investigate green spaces in such estates using the SWOT/TOWS method, as confirmed by a search of the Web of Science and Scopus databases. The study area included two such estates located in two Polish cities: Toruń (Rubinkowo I) and Kraków (Bronowice Nowe). The study used the SWOT/TOWS method and an urban-architectural inventory research walk. The results of the study indicate that the best strategy for developing green spaces in estates of this kind is the competitive strategy, which involves taking advantage of opportunities while reducing the weaknesses of green spaces. The research walk also identified a diverse composition of green space species and a high proportion of green spaces in the overall estate area. In addition, green spaces are socially inclusive and can be an important element of urban resilience. The results of this research contribute to the discussion on the condition and future of green spaces in the estates.

This study investigates patterns in the chaotic appearance of self-help incremental housing in a kampung settlement. Many previous studies have investigated suitable incremental housing for low-income residents, but the pattern of self-help incremental housing has not been carefully investigated. The shape grammar method is used to identify the delivered pattern of self-help incremental housing, and in-depth interviews are performed to clarify the reasons for the pattern found. This study finds that the organized chaotic pattern of self-help incremental housing depends on geographical location and familial relationships, which allow construction over the perimeter of a land parcel through negotiation to reach agreement between homeowners and neighbors. Further, self-help incremental housing is driven by external and internal factors, such as the lack of affordability in the housing market, the mismatch of available job opportunities with the credentials and competencies, and the practiced social relationships among kin or relatives, which demand the expansion of the size of the residence to allow sufficient meeting space and privacy for the core and extended family members.

This paper delves into Egypt’s housing landscape, revealing a nuanced challenge beyond quantity or quality: a horizontal disequilibrium in housing service distribution. Through an analysis of dwelling production and vacancy rates, the authors uncover how the prevailing institutional framework obstructs housing cooperatives from catering to the needs of middle- and low-income families. A dichotomy of allocation of services has forced the less fortunate to use informal settlements as their prime dwelling. Consequently, the notion of housing cooperatives rose to solve the imbalanced equation between public sector-driven and private sector-led economies. Institutional Framework Analysis is the framework the authors used to investigate the constrained role of these cooperatives in providing affordable housing. The authors examined three major housing cooperatives in the Greater Cairo Region, using document reviews and stakeholder interviews to illuminate how institutional constraints impede formal dwellings’ production within young couples’ financial reach. The erosion of cooperative autonomy, exchanged for financial support, further exacerbates this challenge. Addressing legislative barriers, adopting universal norms, and broadening operational scopes are imperative to revitalise the cooperative movement. This paper underscores the pivotal role of institutional dynamics in disrupting housing market mechanisms, challenging conventional perceptions of housing problems as solely short- or long-term issues. The research also proposes a bottom-up approach depicted in participatory practices as the prime guiding scheme for a successful sustainable cooperative framework.

Social mix and the connection of the most disadvantaged sectors of the population to urban services lie at the heart of current housing policy in Chile. With the help of social and territorial integration, the policy seeks to remedy the acute, long-standing crisis of segregation in Chilean cities. The evidence enables us to classify the process into stages, highlighting the role of the State, private agents and social demand in achieving social integration through social mix based on the provision of housing subsidies, the inclusion of the working class in the city, and the possibility of producing urban spaces to support encounter rather than exclusion. The intersection of these agencies has given rise to the discussions upon which the structure of the present article is based, and we offer a variety of conceptual approaches to the political foundations of the housing debate and its agency in the question of social mix. We conduct a critical discourse analysis covering legislative and political sources and scientific and press articles that address the question of social mix, beginning with a classification of integration processes over time. We then go on to discuss current spatial outcomes in Chile’s major cities. We conclude with reflections to guide future debates on the subject, paying particular attention to the political capacity of the State and private agents in the struggle to capture the idea of social integration through subsidised housing.

The features of the micro-location and in particular the micro-neighborhood that residents perceive on a daily basis have a considerable influence on the quality of living and also on housing prices. For automated valuation models (AVMs), the use of micro-neighborhood information would be beneficial, as incorporating additional spatial effects into the price estimate could potentially reduce the empirical error. However, measuring related features is difficult, as they must first be defined and then collected, which is extremely challenging at such a small spatial level. In this study, we investigate the extent to which the quality of micro-neighborhoods can be assessed holistically using multiple data modalities. We design a scalable approach using alternative data (images and text), with the potential to expand coverage to other urban regions. To achieve this, we propose a multimodal deep learning architecture that integrates both textual and visual inputs and fuses this information. In addition, we introduce a training strategy that enables a targeted fusion of orthogonal visual representations of the residential area within the model architecture. In our experiments, we test and compare different unimodal models with our multimodal architectures. The results demonstrate that the multimodal model with targeted fusion of the orthogonal visual inputs achieves the best performance and also improves the prediction accuracy for underrepresented location quality classes.

Just a few decades after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights pronounced housing as a human right in 1948, the concept of the home as shelter was overshadowed by home ownership and asset creation, resulting in inadequate affordable housing, or homelessness for many, in urban contexts. Despite this, the house as a material and spatial artefact and the production of the home are consistently in negotiation by individuals and groups who are marginalized from the hegemonic private housing and real estate system. This article is an examination of the ways in which radical practices of everyday homemaking can inform professional design practice and policy to facilitate better housing for dignified inhabitation. The study of houses self-built or upgraded in Mumbai, India, and Brighton and Hove, United Kingdom, demonstrate that living takes place through shifting imaginations of the house as property to that of the home, involving aspiration and flexibility. This form of design is produced by persistently reworking the home, through innovative design solutions that assemble spatial and material bricolages and non-standard designs, implemented by a slew of small-time contractors and workers that form an extended ecology of design practice. These findings open new logics of delivery systems and consequent configurations of space that enrich lived relationships, experiences, and imaginations, often overlooked by mainstream frameworks of housing. This article, therefore, expands the debate on housing quantity to meet the current housing needs, to include quality of living within these, that can be influenced through a reformulation of professional design practice and policy. Comparing the two cities across the Global South and the Global North develops an understanding of generalizations and the particularities related to housing contexts, and informs how housing precarity operates beyond a certain locality.

Decoupling, or the practice of communicating different organizational values and goals than those rigorously pursued, is a concept discussed in the organization theory literature. Organizations engage in it when their legitimacy hinges on obtaining the support of stakeholders with disparate interests, and they attempt to appease some stakeholders with words and others with actions. One problem with decoupling is that it can lead organizations to operate in ways that are not reflective of their stated missions. With this concern in mind, the analysis presented here explores the prevalence of decoupling in the U.S. affordable housing industry and considers how, when, and why it occurs, and to what effect. Thematic analysis of interview data collected from industry practitioners suggests decoupling is common, comes in multiple forms, and must be effectively managed if municipal governments hope to partner with for-profit and nonprofit affordable housing providers to achieve their social policy goals.

In recent years, there has been a rapid urbanization trend observed in many countries. This trend poses sustainable development in the long run due to various urban problems. The Iranian government launched a project of affordable housing for low-income residents in response to this rapid urbanization. As different social issues arose after mass affordable housing was implemented in Iran, it is important to assess residents’ place attachment to these projects and their impacts on residents’ satisfaction. This study therefore served two distinct objectives. The study’s first objective was to determine whether place attachment is related to residential satisfaction. In addition, this study examined the mediating role of social capital between place attachment and residential satisfaction. The study used data gathered from residents of Mehr affordable housing in Pardis, Tehran, to examine the relationship between place attachment and residential satisfaction through the mediation of social capital. This was achieved by surveying 370 residents of Mehr affordable housing in Pardis and then analyzing the collected data using structural equation modeling. Considering the data, the model demonstrated appropriate goodness of fit. Place attachment was found to have a relationship with residential satisfaction. Additionally, the research found that social capital mediates the relationship between these two variables. These findings suggest that policymakers should prioritize strategies to foster place attachment and social capital to ensure long-term satisfaction and sustainability of affordable housing projects. This can be achieved through creating attractive and accessible social spaces, promoting social interaction, and incorporation of necessary amenities within affordable housing projects.