Courtyard housing as a subtropical urban design model

Through both theory and practice, this practice-based research develops and tests the idea that courtyard housing can deliver sustainable, compact housing in rapidly growing subtropical cities. It proposes a contemporary urban design model that incorporates urban design courtyard housing prototypes. These prototypes can be further developed by architects and urban designers for similar climatic conditions across the world.

House value as an indicator of cumulative wealth is strongly related to morbidity and mortality risk in older people: a census-based cross-sectional and longitudinal study

Background: There has been relatively little research into health inequalities in older populations. This may be partly explained by the difficulty in identifying appropriate indicators of socio-economic status for older people. Ideally, indicators of socio-economic status to be used in studies of health inequalities in older populations should incorporate some measure of life-time socio-economic standing, and house value may fill this role. This study examined whether an indicator of accumulated wealth based on a combination of housing tenure and house value was a strong predictor of ill-health in older populations.
Methods: A total of 191 848 people aged =65 years and not living in communal establishments were identified from the 2001 Northern Ireland Census and followed for 5 years. Self-reported health and mortality risk by housing tenure/house value groupings were examined while controlling for a range of other demographic and socio-economic characteristics.
Results: Housing tenure/house value was highly correlated with other indicators of socio-economic status. Public-sector renters had worse self-reported health and higher mortality rates than owner occupiers but significant gradients were also found between those living in the highest-and lowest-valued owner-occupier properties. The relationship between housing tenure and value was unchanged by adjustment for indicators of social support and quality of the physical environment. Adjustment for limiting long-term illness and self-reported health at baseline narrowed but did not eliminate the health gains associated with living in more expensive housing.
Conclusions: House value of residence is an accessible and powerful indicator of accumulated wealth that is highly correlated with current health status and predictive of future mortality risk in older populations.

The effect of ground leases on house prices in Helsinki

One imperfection in housing markets is imperfect knowledge about legal interests such as ground leases. Both actual reduced legal interest as well as uncertainty surrounding rights and future lease payments for houses constructed on leased land may affect prices relative to houses built on freehold land. We use regression analysis of sales prices of condominium transactions in Helsinki to examine the effect ground leases have on house prices. We find that prices on condominiums constructed on leased lots are discounted at least 5 %, on average. In addition, we see that the announcement of potentially large increases in base rents upon renewal contributes to the discount.

House Building and Personal Finance-A Study of Salaried Employees in Kerala

School of Management Studies,Cochin University of Science and Technology

Early roman-period Nazareth and the sisters of Nazareth convent

First discovered by accident in 1884 – and thereafter informally investigated by workmen, nuns and clergy, for several decades – the archaeological site at the Sisters of Nazareth convent in central Nazareth has remained unpublished and largely unknown to scholarship. However, work by the Nazareth Archaeological Project in 2006–10 showed that this site offers a full and important stratified sequence from ancient Nazareth, including well-preserved Early Roman-period and later features. These include a partially rock-cut structure, here re-evaluated and interpreted on the basis of both earlier and newly recorded data as a first-century ad domestic building – perhaps a ‘courtyard house’ – the first surface-built domestic structure of this date from Nazareth to be published, and the best preserved. The site was subsequently used in the Roman period for burial, suggesting settlement contraction or settlement shift.

House-poor/house-rich.

Mode of access: Internet.

An analysis of the Brisbane residential property market and the global financial crisis

The period from 2007 to 2009 covered the residential property boom from early 2000, to the property recession following the Global Financial Crisis. Since late 2008, a number of residential property markets have suffered significant falls in house prices, buth this has not been consistent across all market sectors. This paper will analyze the housing market in Brisbane Australia to determine the impact, similarities and differences that the4 GFC had on range of residential sectors across a divesified property market. Data analysis will provide an overview of residential property prices, sales and listing volumes over the study period and will provide a comparison of median house price performance across the geographic and socio-economic areas of Brisbane.

Assessing the real value in residential property investment

One of the major fall outs from the Global Financial Crisis has been the decline in residential property construction, home lending and residential property prices. This has lead to some extent to a reduction in the number of small investors willing to commit funds to an investment market that is not seen to perform as well as other investment assets, particularly in relation to income return.With a decreasing supply of rental accommodation in the housing markets, less public housing being constructed by both State and Commonwealth Governments, there is the potential for the residential property market to provide more substantial returns than previous years.This paper will analyse the current residential housing market in Brisbane, Australia to determine if there are sectors in this market that are outperforming the average income and total return for residential investment property and the variation in investment performance across the various housing sub-markets. The results show that property investment in residential property provides opportunities to maximize returns based on geographic location and socio-economic economic status, with lower value areas showing the highest income returns and higher value suburbs showing greater capital returns

Residential property investment : assessing home ownership long term viability

Home purchase and ownership is seen by the majority of Australians as the basis for a sound investment strategy and to seciure their long term retirement goals. Although home ownership rates in Australia are in excess of 65% of the population, there have been doubts raised as to the effectiveness of purchasing a house as the main source of retirement income. The main issue with this approach is that the house has to be sold to gain access to these funds or the owners have to take out a reverse mortgage to access the capital tied up in their home, which can be more expensive than selling. This paper will carryout a detailed analysis of a number of investment options to determine the effectiveness of home purchase as a long term investment vehicle. This study has found that the long term investment in equities or managed superannuation funds can provide a greater retirement income than the purchase of a residential property for owner occupation

Social and physical environments in senior communities: The Finnish experience

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss residents’ views of social and physical environments in a co-housing and in a senior housing setting in Finland. Also, the study aims to point out important connections between well-being and built environment. Design/methodology/approach – The data include interviews and survey responses gathered in the cases. The results and analysis are presented at different case study levels, with the discussion and conclusions following this. Findings – The findings show that the physical environment and common areas have an important role to activate residents. When well-designed common areas exist, a higher level of engagement can be achieved by getting residents involved in the planning and running of activities. Research limitations/implications – This paper discusses residents’ experiences in two Finnish housing settings and it focuses on the housing market in Finland. Practical implications – The findings encourage investors and housing operators to design and invest common areas which could activate residents and create social contacts. Also, investors have to pay attention to the way these developments are managed. Originality/value – This study is the first to investigate the Finnish co-housing setting and compare social and physical environments in a co-housing and a senior house.

Urban dynamics evaluation of Envigado city

This article presents the methodological conceptualization and the main results of a System Dynamics model, which main objective is to support the housing policies in the city of Envigado -- The used methodology developed a scenario-based model to emulate the approximate evolution of the housing demand and supply for the city, using a scenario of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and a housing authorization strategy as input -- Diverse results were obtained, for instance it was found that due to the soil availability, the housing supply reaches the saturation point between 2040 and 2046 -- Finally this article could be considered as an example of how academic tools such as System Dynamics can be used by decisions makers in the government

East Quadrangle [Interior Courtyard]

Built 1940. Part of the building of residence halls for men under the "Michigan House Plan." Morrison & Gabler, architects. Addition in 1946-1948

Analyzing the literature for the link between the conservative Islamic culture of Saudi Arabia and the design of sustainable housing

Saudi Arabia experiences housing shortage for mid and low-income families, which is caused by rapid population growth. This condition is worsened by the fact that the current housing supply has problems in meeting both sustainable requirements and cultural needs of those families. This paper aims to investigate the link between the unique conservative Saudi culture and the design of sustainable housing, while keeping the housing cost affordable for mid and low-income families. The paper is based on a review of literatures on the issues of the Islamic culture and how can they be integrated into the design process of a Saudi house. Findings from literature reveiw suggest several design requirements for accommodating the conservative Saudi Culture in low cost sustainable houses. Such requirements include the implementation of proper usage of windows, and house orientation with a courtyard inside rather than facing the main street will provide natural ventilation while maintaining privacy. The main contribution to the body of knowledge is that this is a new approach to sustainable housing in Saudi Arabia considering not only energy use and architectural design issues but also socio-cultural issues as an essential part of sustainability.

Integration of Saudi Arabia’s conservative Islamic culture in sustainable housing design

The cities of Saudi Arabia have perhaps the largest growth rates of cities in the Middle East, such that it has become a cause in shortage of housing for mid and low-income families, as is the case in other developing countries. Even when housing is found, it is not sustainable nor is it providing the cultural needs of those families. The aim of this paper is to integrate the unique conservative Islamic Saudi culture into the design of sustainable housing. This paper is part of a preliminary study of an on-going PhD thesis, which utilises a semistructured interview of a panel of nine experts in collecting the data. The interviews consisted of ten questions ranging from general questions such as stating their expertise and work position to more specific question such as listing the critical success factors and/or barriers for applying sustainability to housing in Saudi Arabia. Since the participants were selected according to their experience, the answers to the interview questions were satisfactory where the generation of the survey questions for the second stage in the PhD thesis took place after analysing the participant’s answers to the interview questions. This paper recommends design requirements for accommodating the conservative Islamic Saudi Culture in low cost sustainable houses. Such requirements include achieving privacy through the use of various types of traditional Saudi architectural elements, such as the method of decorative screening of windows, called Mashrabiya, and having an inner courtyard where the house looks inward rather than outward. Other requirements include educating firms on how to design sustainable housing, educating the public on the advantages of sustainable housing and implementing new laws that enforce the utilisation of sustainable methods to housing construction. This paper contributes towards the body of knowledge by proposing initial findings on how to integrate the conservative Islamic culture of Saudi Arabia into the design of a sustainable house specifically for mid and low-income families. This contribution can be implemented on developing countries in the region that are faced with housing shortage for mid and low-income families.