Developing and Evaluating a Virtual Reality-Based Navigation System for Pre-Sale Housing Sales

Yi-Kai Juan,Hsing-Hung Chen,Hao-Yun Chi

doi:10.3390/app8060952

Yi-Kai Juan, Hsing-Hung Chen + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/app8060952

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Abstract

Virtual reality (VR) technologies have advanced rapidly in the past few years, and many industries have adopted these cutting-edge technologies for diverse applications to improve their industrial competitiveness. VR has also received considerable recognition in the architecture, engineering, and construction industries, because it can potentially reduce project costs, delivery time, and quality risks, by allowing users to experience unbuilt spaces before breaking ground, resolving construction conflicts virtually, and reviewing complex details in immersive environments. In the real estate market, VR can also play an important role in affecting buyers’ housing purchasing decisions, especially for housing markets in Asia, where the pre-sale system is extremely common. Applying VR to the pre-sale housing system is promising, because the concept of pre-sale refers to a strategy adopted by developers that sell housing through agreements on residential units that have not been constructed yet, and VR at this stage could be a useful tool for visual communication in a true-to-scale environment. However, does VR really benefit sales in the housing market? Can clients accept using VR, instead of using traditional materials (i.e., paper-based images and physical models), to navigate and experience housing projects? The objective of this study is to develop a VR-based navigation system for a pre-sale housing project in Taiwan. We invited 30 potential clients to test the system and explore the implications of using it for project navigation. The results reveal that VR enhances the understandings of a project (perceived usefulness) and increases clients’ intention to purchase, while the operation of VR (perceived ease-of-use) is still the major challenge to affect clients’ satisfaction and the developer’s acceptance with respect to applying it to future housing sales.

Highlights

With the advance of information technology and the acceleration of computer computing, virtual reality (VR) technologies have been widely used in education, entertainment, medicare, architectural design, engineering construction, aerospace technology, and other sectors [1,2,3] with high value
Based on all the data, we find that VR significantly contributes to housing sales and consumers’
VR is presently widely used in various industries, and many studies have shown that it can effectively improve their efficiency and improve upon their inefficiencies

Summary

Introduction

With the advance of information technology and the acceleration of computer computing, virtual reality (VR) technologies have been widely used in education, entertainment, medicare, architectural design, engineering construction, aerospace technology, and other sectors [1,2,3] with high value It is regarded by many organizations as an important technological medium to reflect a company’s core value and promote customers’ relationships with the company [4]. VR is a pure virtual digital image that fully utilizes display technology It is a new milestone in the way we interact with the environment, and how we conceive new approaches in the relationship with reality [5]. VR can enhance users’ “immersion, interaction and imagination” [9], and become a research tool of effective human–environment interaction [10,11,12,13,14]

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