Posts

[2000 Words; 10 Minute Read] It is important to improve understanding of how cities can be better financed to meet affordable housing challenges over the

Read MoreFinancing Affordable Housing – Some Fiscal Approaches used in the United States

[800 Words; 5 Minute Read] Research methodology often incorporates case studies, and it is important to outline case study epistemological merits and limitations. Firstly, the

Read MoreCase study research – using case studies by geography

[1000 Words; 5 Minute Read] A Public Private Partnership (PPP) is a public service or private business venture that is funded and operated through a

Read MorePublic Private Partnerships (PPP) – A win-win situation?

[1500 Words; 10 Minute Read] This article looks at ‘environmental resource’ issues in connection with water. We look at ‘externalities’ as the third-party costs and

[1300 Words; 10 Minute Read]. The post explores what is involved and could be considered when transferring policy from one context to another. At the

Read MorePolicy Transfer: Why do we see the same ideas and practice around the world? – 5 Key Aspects

[1200 Words; 4 Minute Read] Concern over climate change and a focus to improve and protect natural resources and improve ecological health have been promoted

Read MoreSustainable Urban Development – Connecting Urban and Environmental Economics

Given some recent announcements on social (public) housing provision in New Zealand, I have graphed the changes in tenure since 1991 to the start of

Read MoreNew Zealand Tenure Changes 1991 to 2016

[2000 Words; 15 Minute Read] Policy in affordable housing supply is responding to the challenge of housing markets where unaffordability prevails. Often measured by high

Read MoreAffordable Housing – a Community Reinvestment Solution?

In this post, we focus on the importance of methods and concepts to aid new ideas and discussion. Natural sciences often place emphasis on positivist

[2000 Words; 20 Minute Read] There are forms of market failure due to external costs and benefits that need to be calculated and internalized to

Read MoreHow can you Value the Built and Natural Environment? Cost-Benefit Analysis

[1100 Words; 4 Minute Read] “Decent, affordable housing is fundamental to the health and well-being of people and to the smooth functioning of economies” (Woetzel

Read MoreHousing Affordability Determinants

[1200 Words; 10 Minute Read] In order to frame research within a particular philosophy a critical realist approach can be taken, especially to gain a

Read MoreCritical Realism as a Research Philosophy – Enlightened Common Sense?

[1000 Words; 5 Minute Read] In discussing globalisation, the term can be described as the convergence of markets, economies and ways of life across the

Read MoreWhy will Globalisation prevail? The enduring forces and enablers

Introduction [3000 Words; 23 Minute Read] The last few decades globally has seen a move away from seeing housing design as part of the development

Read MoreHousing Development and Design in Cities

[100 Words; 10 Minute Read] In addition to the more localised economic mechanisms that operate in urban areas, the wider open economy will shape how

[1000 Words; 10 Minute Read] This post looks at what “Weighted-Blended” Finance Mechanisms are the most appropriate framing to consider the financing of affordable housing

[2000 Words; 20 Minute Read] In examining the effectiveness of the investment practice known as ‘Socially Responsible Property Investment’ (SRPI), funds and developers make special

[1500 Words; 10 Minute Read] The valuation of external costs and benefits will be difficult but necessary if the full cost or benefit to society

[2000 Words; 15 Minute Read] Choice is an important element in economic thinking if there are scarce resources and infinite wants. Urban areas that are

Time and Discounting [2500 Words; 20 Minute Read] For major project feasibility and decision making, if cost and benefit items have been identified and valued,

[3500 Words; 20 Minute Read] It is important to improve understanding of how cities can be better financed to meet affordable housing challenges over the

[2000 Words; 10 minute Read] The Private Finance Initiative (PFI) is defined as a form of procurement to encourage private investment in public sector projects.

[500 Words; 2 Minute Read] Housing affordability as a rental tenure issue has become an increasingly debated area. Particularly as Haffner and Boumeester (2010) argue

[3100 Words; Reading Time 24 Mins] Ideas, concepts and theories are developed from intellectual thoughts that are of importance when studying urban and environmental economics.

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[1500 Words; 20 Minute Read] This article introduces an understanding of the use of Socially Responsible Property Investment (SRPI) in urban development.  Urban development and

[5,000 Words; 30 Minute Read] The use of bonded financial mechanisms such as Tax Increment Financing (TIF) can lever renewal within a wider policy framework.

Squires, G., and Tommaso, G. (2020). The United Nations – Human Settlement Programme (UN-Habitat), the University College of London (UCL). Innovative governance modalities for urban

Read MoreResearch Projects – Full Archive List

Squires, G., and Susnjak, T. (2020). Machine Learning for Real Estate and Housing Markets. The Property Foundation Squires, G. (2020). The use of housing charges

Read MoreResearch Reports – Full Archive List

NEWS ARTICLE CONTRIBUTIONS I take a public engagement approach and have been interviewed over 50 times by the media on property-related issues. Recent media outputs

Read MoreNews Articles – Archive Links

Article in National Business Review (NBR) exploring the foreign house buyer ban, Overseas Investment Act All regions showed a drop in affordability over the year.

Read MoreBanning foreign house buyers won’t have much effect – Massey professor

Newshub article on house prices For more than a year, the advice to Aucklanders struggling to buy a home was to move out of the

Read MoreRotorua house prices increasing the most in New Zealand

Article in TVNZ Television New Zealand on Housing Affordability Home affordability has plummeted in many regions across the country over the past year, according to

Read MoreHome affordability drops for Kiwis by almost 10 per cent, report says

Article on New Zealand Herald on Housing Affordability and Tenure It’s further bad news for renters with prices across New Zealand climbing steadily in the

Read MoreRenter pain continues as New Zealand rents jump 25% in five years

Article in Stuff exploring Build to Rent with colleague David White Property specialists at Massey University caution that mass rental housing like apartment blocks need to

Read MoreBuild-to-rent apartments must not become slums, property specialists warn

Article in RNZ relating to a series of industry seminars that myself and colleague David White ran on Build to Rent in New Zealand As

Read MoreBuild to rent: the pros and cons

Time flies when you are an academic. 10+ years ago I completed a PhD from the University of Manchester (UK), that predominantly focused on exploring

Here is a lecture I did a while back on Environmental Impact Assessment

Book Promotion at Delft, Netherlands. International Approaches to Real Estate Development

An online event I hosted on how property pivots in a post Covid 19 world. Note the lockdown beard for future self.

Building a 2nd Brain and Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) In the new pedagogical landscape, I am looking at the limits of teaching and learning as

Read MoreBrains are for having ideas, not storing them

In the lead up to the New Zealand 2020 election it is worthwhile having a look at what proportion of people bother to vote. Here

Read MoreDon’t vote! It only encourages them: Party Votes and Turnout by Electorate

I did some work looking housing affordability trajectories in New Zealand’s regions. All very techy, but essentially evidencing how 4 clustered regions have converged in

Read MoreHousing Affordability in the Regions as Trajectory Regressions – If you are into this kind of thing.

Here we find some initial analysis that I’ve done looking retrospectively on the 2017 election in New Zealand. Its thrown up some interesting aspects that

Read MoreHow to win an Election: New Zealand 2017 Analysis

Over the last few years, I’ve spent some time looking at and engaging with the affordability debate. For New Zealand, it is a significant but

Read MoreNo surprises: Wages haven’t kept up with runaway house prices. Some evidence.

Fast forward 36 years and we see the land value of sales in Auckland’s districts skyrocket. Auckland city at median land value of $500,000 (previously

Read MorePlaying with QGIS: What were Land Values worth in Auckland 2017?

In playing around with QGIS for another project I’ve mapped Auckland district median land values as of 1981. Auckland City land values at a mere

Read MorePlaying with QGIS: What were Land Values worth in Auckland 1981?

Here’s an excerpt from on recent research project on Machine Learning for Real Estate and Housing Markets… “…Here we consider all 21 national-level indicators and

Read MoreGazing into the Crystal Ball: Machine learning to predict house prices

Approaches to international comparative analysis of real estate development can be used to bring out some comparisons in case study sites. Key layers and mechanisms

Read MoreAn ‘innovative’ framework for comparing real estate development

Owner-occupier motivation is multifaceted and complex. It is the precursor to energy efficiency refurbishment (i.e. action) and to encourage a greater uptake such refurbishment better

Read MoreWhat are the motivations for energy efficient refurbishment (EER)?

For New Zealand, at a national scale housing policy trends have encouraged market engagement given its high proportion of residential ownership, with social housing provision

Read MoreMapping Financial Risk and Housing Trends in New Zealand: towards ‘freer’ in a largely free market?

Here’s an excerpt from a recent Journal Paper where we see An acceleration in Auckland and Central Otago Lakes since 2013 Median house price trends

Read MoreRegional house price (sales) trends 2010-2017. An acceleration in Auckland and Central Otago Lakes

Within a current Machine Learning project we start with a baseline look at how house prices have changed over the last 2 decades. Here we

Read More2 Decades of Auckland Median House Prices 2000-2019

The graph depicts the year-on-year percentage changes of the amount of economic activity being generated in the Rental, Hiring and Real-estate Sector over the volatile

Read MoreA Covid-19 Pandemic Retrospective: Activity being generated in the Real-estate Sector over the volatile period during the COVID19 in New Zealand

Great stories piece on State Housing in New Zealand. Only 4% of total stock but has been an essential part of the fabric since 1906.

Read MoreState Housing New Zealand

Editorial for Journal of Property Investment and Finance https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/JPIF-02-2020-141/full/html

Interesting house price index from The Economist post GFC

This data visualisation talk is really good Especially the interesting budget visualisation, demonstrating the enormous relative impact of the GFC

Software to help with referencing is a good way to build up and manage your own dataset of articles. Here are a couple of good

Read MoreReferencing Techniques

A really useful starting point in understanding the PropTech field is from the consultancy-university report authored by Andrew Baum at Oxford University https://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2018-07/PropTech3.0.pdf

https://doi.org/10.1080/21681376.2019.1643777

When using online survey methods, two useful software products are Qualtrics and Survey Monkey. Basic techniques for analysing the findings are also available in the

Read MoreOnline Survey Methods

‘Research’ is a term that covers a multitude of activities, but in one way or another they are all about finding things out. At one

Read MoreWhat is Research?

For quantifying and analysing qualitative data I tend to use NVivo. Here’s a link to the software page: https://www.qsrinternational.com/nvivo/nvivo-products

Here’s part of an article I wrote for the main online NZ media outlet stuff.co.nz on housing affordability prior to the 2017 election… Talk of

Read More2 years on: Is the Housing Affordability crisis still a crisis?

https://youtu.be/UZnoOuMwupM

Institutions providing access to housing in all tenures have become further entrenched and exposed to financial risk. Literature on housing policy trends and financial risk

Read MoreTowards Financial Risk and Housing Policy Trends

Ten years after the Global Financial Crisis, this research examines how resilience theory and rhetoric relating to the economy and housing markets has been translated into policy and

Read MoreResilience and housing markets: Who is it really for?

In  a journal paper we argue that Disruptive Innovation Theory indicates that there is disruptive potential of Real Estate Crowd-Funding (RECF). As an excerpt…”RECF seems

Read MoreCrowdfunding real estate

              Policymakers in New Zealand are attempting to achieve improved environmental outcomes by implementing an output-based approach to non-point-source

Read MoreImproving water quality with rural land use policy: (re)balancing farmland regulation, intensification and financial viability

                          Real estate development shapes the way people live and work, playing a

Read MoreMy New Edited Book – Routledge Companion to Real Estate Development

          The latest Massey University Home Affordability Report shows most regions of New Zealand have declined in affordability over the most

Read MoreHome affordability declines in most New Zealand regions

The Massey Home Affordability Index takes into account the cost of borrowing as well as house prices and wage levels. This March quarter has seen

Read MoreCentral Otago Lakes has now Surpassed Auckland as the Most Unaffordable Region in New Zealand

The Massey Affordability Index takes into account the cost of borrowing as well as house prices and wage levels. This December quarter has seen a

Read MoreRising House Prices Still Drive Housing Affordability Metrics

It is important to consider the merits of using projects bonds to finance infrastructure investment projects – in particular, the pricing of such bonds and the level

Read MoreFinancing infrastructure development: time to unshackle the bonds?

                This research provides an insight into large-scale real estate projects in Europe and how they are using

Read MoreInnovative real estate development finance – evidence from Europe

                      Real estate development is a significant factor in planning the built environment. It shapes

Read MoreMethods and models for international comparative real estate development

                Neighbourhoods within area-based initiatives that are engaged with regeneration and renewal often experience difficulties of poverty, disadvantage

Read MoreDysfunctional Neighbourhoods Exist: More Urban Regeneration Needed

                There are some 487,000 places in long-stay residential care and nursing homes in the UK representing an

Read MoreThe difference between property bonds and leases – and the consequences for healthcare.

A critical review and analysis of innovative financial instruments for real estate development in Europe will be useful to EU and European national policy makers

Read MoreInnovative Development Finance in Europe

Can finance bonding be centred more on affordable housing as well as infrastructure? Some interesting nuances and lessons can be drawn when using a Tax Increment

Read MoreLessons in finance bonding for affordable housing

    In considering heritage for buildings within Enterprise Zones, the central premise has been focusing on economic growth, with less thought given to the wider structural and cultural

Read MoreIs Building Heritage in Enterprise Zones The Latest Threat or Opportunity?

          New forms of governance, conditional approaches to public service access, and initiatives to engage citizens in taking on new responsibilities

Read MoreReturning to Rousseau – Is there a Contract Between Citizen and State?

                The last 15 years has seen significant changes in the location, type, delivery and design of urban

Read MoreA housing numbers game? The new housing quality design challenge

            How do housing stakeholders align future private and public spending to identify investment opportunities and help meet the City’s broader economic and spatial

Read MoreSolutions to the housing crisis – Housing Associations in the Private Rented Sector?

It is important to improve understanding of how cities can be better financed to meet challenges over the short and long-term; be they economic, social

Read MoreFuture financing cities through planning and development

Environmental resource issues involving water need to consider third-party external costs (and benefits) – water pollution being one example. Natural resource economics can be applied to this issue and set in

Read MoreUrban water economics – putting a value, price, and cost on natural resources

              The existing housing stock needs substantial adaptation to meet national and international carbon reduction targets. The largest proportion

Read MoreMotivations for energy efficiency refurbishment

              It is worth looking at the impact of community self-build schemes, especially as many have helped ex-service personnel rehabilitate

Read MoreCommunity self-build schemes enabling holistic solutions for ex-servicemen

If the public purse is being squeezed we should start thinking about whether private resources should be used to fund public goods and services. When

Read MoreShould developers pay for public goods and services ? The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL)

  There is a need to learn lessons when using spatially targeted fiscal experiments if intervention is to generate wider developmental benefit. For Enterprise Zone concept

Read MoreLessons need to be learned from Enterprise Zones and Empowerment Zones

Urban policy transfer between the US and UK has long been of interest to researchers and practitioners. Given the recent wider context of reduced direct

Read MoreTax Increment Financing (TIF) as an urban policy for spatially targeted economic development initiatives

I completed a PhD from the University of Manchester (2009), that predominantly focused on exploring the drivers and dynamics associated with what I termed ‘low

Read MoreLow Demand Neighbourhoods – Housing Market Renewal Experience

          I have been practicing transcendental meditation (TM) for nearly 2 years. It was one of the best decisions I have

Read MoreTranscendental Meditation (TM)

If you need a companion to understand real estate development this collection is the best around

First class collection of real estate development literature, with an international framing.

Best there is if you are interested in procuring and building

And what a book.

Wonderful introduction to economics in the field of property from my old room mate.