Single-detached Houses Research Articles

House Type Specification for Housing Development Project Using Machine Learning Techniques: A Study From Bangkok Metropolitan Region, Thailand

Specifying the house type of a housing development project is extremely necessary. However, the determination of a project type nowadays has become a delicate matter, requiring the expertise and knowledge of seasoned project developers. This study aimed to apply four machine learning techniques: Decision Tree, Random Forest, Gradient Boosted Tree and Ensemble Classifier, to analyze the data from 179 housing estate projects collected from market reports of real estate companies in Thailand, with a focus on selecting projects with average monthly sales rates that are higher than the average of all acquired projects. This process resulted in a reduced dataset of 59 projects, including 31 townhouses, 22 single-family houses, and six semi-detached houses. As a result, the Ensemble Classifier model has the highest accuracy of 90.91%. The factors most influential in identifying the type of project are the distances from a main road, sky train station, bus station, hospital, and department store. Single-detached house projects are suitable for locations with high potential. The ideal location should be in proximity to a main road, bus station, department store, and hospital. In addition, townhouse projects are ideal for medium-potential locations that are not near shopping malls, but still require proximity to a hospital, sky train station, or bus station. Ultimately, semi-detached house projects are ideal for medium-potential locations that require proximity to a main road for convenient access to sky train station or public transportation, depending on the specific context.

Sales rate forecasting of single-detached houses using artificial neural network technique

Although the predicted number of sold units per month is one of the most necessary information to study the feasibility of detached-housing estate projects, traditional forecasting methods are limited. The research objective was to apply the Artificial Neural Network (ANN) technique to develop a sales rate forecasting model by compiling factors from an appropriate literature review. Then, 100 housing project data were collected from market research reports and the projects' websites and analyzed using the ANN technique. The results showed the ANN network with 16 input nodes from 10 factors: Selling price, Number of bathrooms, Number of bedrooms, Distance from the main road, Distance from the bus stop, Distance from the expressway, Distance from the metro station, Distance from the gas station, Distance from the shopping mall, and Project location zone. The acquired model had a Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) of ±6.296, and the slope and R2 values of the linear regression analysis between the forecasted rate and the actual rate were 0.620 and 0.571, respectively. The findings guide real estate developers and academia on the factors affecting the sales rate and provide a decision support model for investment and design of projects and confirm the potential of ANN in solving the problem with limited numbers of data.

Feasibility of Planting Trees around Buildings as a Nature-Based Solution of Carbon Sequestration—An LCA Approach Using Two Case Studies

In response to Canada’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and to making pathways to achieve carbon neutral buildings, this paper presents two real case studies. The paper first outlines the potential of trees to absorb CO2 emissions through photosynthesis, and the methods used for the estimation of their annual carbon sequestration rates. The net annual carbon sequestration rate of 0.575 kgCO2eq/m2 of tree cover area is considered in our study. Then, this paper presents the carbon life cycle assessment of an all-electric laboratory at Concordia University and of a single-detached house, both located in Montreal. The life cycle assessment (LCA) calculations were performed using two software tools, One Click LCA and Athena Impact Estimator for Buildings. The results in terms of Global Warming Potential (GWP) over 60 years for the laboratory were found to be 83,521 kgCO2eq using One Click LCA, and 82,666 kgCO2eq using Athena. For the single-detached house that uses natural gas for space heating and domestic hot water, the GWP was found to be 544,907 kgCO2eq using One Click LCA, and 566,856 kgCO2eq using Athena. For the all-electric laboratory, a garden fully covered with representative urban trees could offset around 17% of the total life cycle carbon emissions. For the natural gas-powered single-detached house, the sequestration by trees is around 3% of the total life cycle carbon emission. This paper presents limits for achieving carbon neutral buildings when only the emissions sequestration by trees is applied, and discusses the main findings regarding LCA calculations under different scenarios.

The Effects of Design Combinations of Surface Materials and Plants on Outdoor Thermal Conditions during Summer around a Single-Detached House: a Numerical Analysis

Suburban areas with low-density buildings are subject to only limited shading from adjacent buildings. As a result, these areas have more surface area absorbing more radiation, which has the effect of increasing urban temperatures compared with built-up high-density areas. This study aims to assess the combinations of landscape design, namely the integration of wall-paint colors, used to influence the outdoor thermal conditions around a single house in a housing cluster in suburban Bangkok, Thailand. The investigation used the ENVI-met model to perform diurnal profiles of the air temperature (Ta), relative humidity (RH), direct and diffuse solar radiation, and wind speed (WS) in summer. The results show that only a single design element adversely affected the cooling effect, while other combinations of landscape design significantly improved outdoor thermal conditions. It was found that a combination of light wall-paint colors and trees planted near the house provided the maximum reduction in Ta of 0.7°C (1.6% from the base case), and a 2.7% reduction in the noon solar radiation. High-reflectance wall-paint was found to have a secondary influence of up to 0.2°C on the Ta, while the temperature reductions from changing the ground-cover materials had only a slight impact. Finally, landscape designs integrating wall-paint colors to promote a cooler outdoor environment are proposed.

COVID-19 Impact on Residential Preferences in the Early-Stage Outbreak in South Korea.

In the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic in South Korea, public fear or social scaring of urban living was observed, which caused people to change their daily routines. This study examines how the COVID-19 pandemic affected residential choice and perceptions of urban living. We analyzed self-reported survey data collected from 2000 participants in Seoul, Daegu, and Kyeongbuk in South Korea between 3–6 August 2020, targeting the relatively controlled period after the first COVID-19 outbreak. Logistic regression models were used to examine concerns of urban living and residence relocation consideration. Those who were aged 30 or older, regularly commuting, not feeling healthy, with a household size of two, and living in a low-rise condominium were more likely to be concerned with urban living. Those who were aged 40 or older and living in a townhouse or a single-detached house were more likely to consider moving to a less dense area. People perceived that their daily routine changed substantially after the pandemic. Certain participant groups showed concerns of urban living and relocation consideration, suggesting housing policy implications.

Decarbonizing Local Mobility and Greenhouse Agriculture through Residential Building Energy Upgrades: A Case Study for Québec

Electrification is an efficient way to decarbonize by replacing fossil fuels with low-emission power. In addition, energy efficiency measures can reduce consumption, making it easier to shift to a zero-carbon society. In Québec, upgrades to aging buildings that employ electric resistance heating offer a unique opportunity to free up large amounts of hydroelectricity that can serve to decarbonize heating in other buildings. However, another source of energy would be needed to electrify mobility because efficiency measures free up small amounts of electricity in summer compared to winter. This study reveals how building efficiency measures combined with solar electricity generation provide an energy profile that matches the requirements for decarbonizing both mobility and heating. The TRNSYS software was used to simulate the annual energy performance of an existing house and retrofitted/rebuilt low-energy houses equipped with a photovoltaic (PV) roof in Montreal, Québec, Canada (45.5° N). The electricity that is made available by upgrading the houses is mainly considered for powering battery and fuel cell electric vehicles (BEVs and FCEVs) and electrifying heating in greenhouses. The results indicate that retrofitting 16% or rebuilding 12% of single-detached homes in Québec can provide enough electricity to decarbonize heating energy use in existing greenhouses and to operate the new greenhouses required for growing all fresh vegetables locally. If all the single-detached houses that employ electric resistance heating are upgraded, 33.4 and 21.8 TWh year−1 of electricity would be available for decarbonization, equivalent to a 19% and 12% increase of the province’s electricity supply for the retrofitted or rebuilt houses, respectively. This is enough energy to convert 83–100% of personal vehicles to BEVs or 35–56% to FCEVs. Decarbonization using the electricity that is made available by upgrading to low-energy solar houses could reduce the province’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by approximately 32% (26.5 MtCO2eq). The time required for the initial embodied GHG emissions to surpass the emissions avoided by electrification ranges from 3.4 to 11.2 years. Building energy efficiency retrofits/rebuilds combined with photovoltaics is a promising approach for Québec to maximize the decarbonization potential of its existing energy resources while providing local energy and food security.

Effects of built environment and weather on demands for transportation network company trips

This paper investigates the effects of the built environment and weather on the demands for transportation network companies (TNC) in Toronto. The research is based on a historical dataset of Uber trips from September 2016 to September 2018 in Toronto. A wide range of built environments, sociodemographic, and weather data are generated at the dissemination area-level and fused with the monthly aggregated Uber dataset. To provide insight into the underlying factors that affect TNC demand, a series of aggregate demand models are estimated using log-transformed constant elasticity demand functions, with consideration of the seasonal lag effect. To capture the weather effect, an autoregressive moving average model is estimated for the downtown core of Toronto. The model results show that the influence of lagged ridership and seasonal lag effect have a positive correlation with TNC demand. The trip generation and attraction models reveal that TNC trips increase where when the commuting trip duration is longer than 60 min. It is found that the number of apartments in a dissemination area is positively correlated with TNC trip generation, while the number of single-detached houses has a negative correlation. The time-series model indicates that temperature and total daily precipitations are positively correlated with TNC demand. Due to the lack of comprehensive data sources on the Uber and Lyft ridership, the policymakers often struggle to make evidence-based policy recommendations to regulate such disruptive technologies. The series of models presented in this study will help us better understand the potential users of transportation network companies (TNC) and the effects of land use, built environment and weather on transportation network company trips.

A spatial difference-in-differences approach to evaluate the impact of light rail transit on property values

How to evaluate the comprehensive costs and benefits of urban light trains is a critical issue. The difference-in-differences technique is widely used in the literature. However, the conventional approach assumes the project does not affect the control group, which might be violated in real life due to social and economic interactions. We refine the DID approach and relax the no-spillover assumption. Through an example of impacts of a new light rail transit on house prices in Edmonton, Canada, we illustrate how the approach can be used to calculate three different treatment effects. The results indicate that the train system has negative impacts on values of single-detached houses nearby the train stations, and the negative effects also spill over to properties outside the treatment zone. Our findings show that the direction and magnitude of project impacts depend on the city size, the design of the train system, and relevant neighborhood characteristics.

Effects of controls and floor construction of radiant floor heating systems for residential application with high variability of solar gains

This article discusses various reactive and predictive controllers, with and without setback, and floor construction, for radiant floor heating in a single-detached house in a cold climate, with high variability in solar gains. Heating energy to the floor and occupant comfort was evaluated. Modeling showed that in general, lower thermal mass floors performed better in cases with lower solar gains variability (lower south-facing glazing area). For high solar gains variability, floors with higher mass tended to provide better comfort, as long as the tubes were located near the surface of the floor. Temperature setback generally was found to provide modest heating energy savings and decreased overheating periods. Proportional–integral–derivative (PID) and outdoor temperature reset with indoor temperature feedback controllers were found to generally perform the best for all cases. It was found that proper selection of controller and floor construction can make a difference in heating energy demand by as much as 25%.

Relationships between invasive plant species occurrence and socio-economic variables in urban green spaces of southwestern British Columbia, Canada

This study was conducted to address the relationship between socio-economic variables and invasive plant species occurrence in parks and natural areas in two cities of Metro Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Invasive plants inventory data in parks and natural areas were acquired from the cities of Surrey (surveyed in 2014–2016) and Coquitlam (surveyed in 2013–2015). Four socio-economic variables were extracted from the 2011 Canada Census, the 2016 National Household Survey, and the 2016 Survey of Household Spending: median household income, population density, single-detached house density, and household expenditure on gardening. Ten topographic/park variables (e.g., elevation, path and trail density) were obtained for each invasive plant observation point. Using an inhomogeneous Poisson point process modelling approach, the relationships between these socio-economic and topographic/park variables and the occurrences of three priority invasive plants—English ivy, knotweed species, and yellow archangel—were evaluated. Population density had positive associations with knotweed species occurrence in both cities as well as English ivy occurrence in Surrey. In Coquitlam, single-detached house density and median household income were identified as significant socio-economic variables for English ivy and yellow archangel, respectively. Results indicate that relationships between socio-economic variables and species occurrence vary with site and target species. This case study demonstrates a possible approach for linking common invasive plant field survey data and socio-economic data to establish relationships. The results can help land managers to establish cost-effective management strategies by providing valuable information needed for monitoring and pro-active management of invasive plants.

Reflections of Urban Transformation on Horizontal City Landscape and Household: Adana Çukurova District Municipality Houses

In Turkey, urban planning works are staying on the agenda with the decisions made at the central level. Because these urban works reached their purpose in some of our cities, whereas these urban works became a big problem of our society. Urban transformation works covering population and settlement problems of human geography will be examined as urban geography and population problems and recommendations for solution will be made. Within the scope of this study, spatial and social changes on the city made by houses that are going to build over the Adana &#199ukurova District Municipality Houses and single-detached houses will be discussed and results obtained through interviews will be interpreted with a geographic point of view. Allocation of apartments according to plot size and the property owners will be indebted are the greatest concerns of property owners. The problems that will arise from the big identity change caused by vertical growth with the construction in the Municipality Houses will be analyzed and the expectations and concerns of people living in Municipality Houses will be determined.

Through the Roof: The High Cost of Barriers to Building New Housing in Canadian Municipalities

The cost of housing has been going through the roof in many parts of Canada. Most government policies have focused on curtailing the demand for housing, but they have not taken meaningful steps to increase housing supply. In any competitive market without barriers to entry, regardless of the product being sold, the overall market price should equal its marginal cost of production. The same is true of housing. The marginal cost of constructing a single-detached house is primarily due to the costs of labour, materials, and time during its physical construction. A well-functioning housing market results in the market price of housing being close to the feasible cost of constructing it. If prices persistently exceed this construction cost, it is often due to barriers that inhibit new construction. These barriers often stem from excessive regulations. We estimate that, because of the barriers to building more single-family houses, homebuyers in the eight most restrictive cities paid an extra $229,000 per new house between 2007 and 2016. In Vancouver, the cost of housing restrictions is by far the largest in Canada, at $600,000 for the average new house, and ranks among the largest internationally as a share of market costs. Why are housing costs so high? We find that restrictions and extra costs on building new housing – such as zoning regulations, development charges, and limits on housing development on both Greenbelt land and land between urban areas and the Greenbelt – are dramatically increasing the price of housing. The extra costs on new and existing homes are over $100,000 in some Ontario municipalities. While land-use regulation can generate important benefits, in most cases studies find that the costs imposed by housing regulation outweigh the benefits. Municipal governments and provinces should enable more housing construction by taking steps such as easing restrictions on developing agricultural land, simplifying and updating zoning bylaws, and reducing development charges.

Proposal for an Improvement Plan of Energy Efficiency Rating Method of Existing Buildings- Focused on single-detached houses

In order for the effective energy policy on buildings, it is essential to improve energy performance of existing buildings with low energy efficiency. Many studies on energy performance assessment of existing buildings were conducted. However, there is not many research on energy efficiency rating method for small-sized existing buildings. Therefore, this purpose of this study is to propose the energy efficiency rating related documents collection process and assessment methodology for existing single-detached houses, and to establish a separate rating system of existing buildings which apply their performance levels. This study comes to the following conclusions: 1) there is a lack of documents about energy efficiency rating of single-detached houses and information for energy performance assessment is mostly omitted, and therefore it is necessary to establish the energy efficiency rating related documents collection process and assessment methodology; 2) by classifying collection methods on the basis of a range of documents held by building owners, the documents collection process-[Process.1], [Process.2], [Process.3], and [Process.4]-is drawn; 3) to provide the requirements on energy performance assessment of existing single-detached houses, the performance of building envelope is based on the legal insulation performance in energy saving design standards. Regarding the documents of machine, electricity, and renewable features, a field survey is conducted so as to write a replacement confirmation including ECO2 requirements.

The joint choice of tenure, dwelling type, size and location: the effect of home-oriented versus culture-oriented lifestyle

This study investigates knowledge-workers’ housing preferences in terms of tenure, dwelling type, location and size. The analysis is conducted by applying a joint multinomial-logit ordered-response model to the housing choices of knowledgeworkers residing in the Tel-Aviv metropolitan region and working in the high-tech and finance sectors. The results confirm the following hypotheses: (i) controlling for socioeconomic characteristics and workplace, knowledge-workers’ housing choices relate to their lifestyle; (ii) knowledge-workers with a culture-oriented lifestyle prefer to rent small apartments in central locations; (iii) knowledge-workers with a home-oriented lifestyle prefer large dwelling units, mainly single-detached houses, in suburban locations.

Measuring buildings for sustainability: Comparing the initial and retrofit ecological footprint of a century home – The REEP House

The residential sector is recognized as a major energy consumer and thus a significant contributor to climate change. Rather than focus only on current energy consumption and the associated emissions, there is a need to broaden sustainability research to include full life cycle contributions and impacts. This paper looks at houses from the perspective of the ecological footprint (EF), a well-known sustainability indicator. Exemplifying single-detached houses of the early 20th century, the century-old REEP House (downtown Kitchener, Canada), together with its high performance energy retrofits, is examined in detail.This research combines material, energy and carbon emission studies. Its scope covers the life cycle of the house, including the direct and indirect consumption of material and energy, and concomitant carbon emissions during its stages of material extraction, transportation, construction, operation, and demolition.It is revealed that the REEP House had a typical impact on the environment when it was built, and, even though the renovations to improve energy efficiency by 80% introduce additional embodied environmental impacts, they are environmentally sound activities because the environmental payback period is less than 2years.

Just beyond the fringe: Churchill Park garden suburb in St. John's, Newfoundland

In the late nineteenth century, Canada suburbs were home to a wide diversity of residents. By the middle of the twentieth century, this widespread pluralism had largely disappeared. Suburbia became the vanguard of the modern, segregated city. Individual suburbs became more regulated, more 'planned' and more middle class (McCann 1999). The gradual loss of suburban living opportunities for Canada's working class population has been called a national 'tragedy' (Harris 1996). Suburbs were originally characterised by housing types not entirely different from those found closer to the urban core, but the 'garden suburb' tradition came to dominate Western cities during the twentieth century. The essence of the garden suburb model was a single-detached house in a private garden, which seemed the perfect way of catering to the desire for living accommodation in the romantic tradition of rus in urbe. The widespread adoption of the garden suburb model transformed streetscape into landscape (Whitehand and Carr 1999, 77). This model, based on the Garden City idea, popularised in Ebenezer Howard's (1965) classic 1902 work Garden Cities of Tomorrow was well known by intellectuals in Canada but arrived in a more formal sense when Thomas Adams came to take up his new position as Town Planning Advisor to the Federal Government's Commission of Conservation in 1915 (Simpson 1985; Stein 1994). During the early years of the twentieth century, Canadian municipal reformers were preoccupied with the problem of slum clearance. Planning was still in its infancy, but it was generally agreed that the best, cheapest and most politically acceptable solution to the 'slum problem' was to build new housing on the suburban fringe (Ravetz 1995) relying on a process that would later be referred to as 'filtering' (Ratcliffe 1945). The 'garden suburb' provided an ideal template for such developments. There are many examples of such suburbs in those parts of the world receptive to British planning practice (Barnett 1986; Hall 1988). The peculiarities of local conditions and practices add interest to the general story of suburban planning and development, and the story told here is therefore just one of many that each make a small contribution to our knowledge of the ways in which Canadian suburban townscapes have evolved. It tells of a development in St. John's, the capital of the Dominion of Newfoundland. For its time, and in its place, it was an audacious undertaking which represented a coming together of the best of current town-planning thinking and practice in a place that many might consider a surprising venue for progressive planning ideas. Churchill Park, as the suburb came to be known, was intended to serve multiple objectives: to promote the clearing of the downtown slums, to advance the cause of social welfare and justice, to introduce modernity to the Avalon peninsula, to provide housing for returning veterans, to facilitate the orderly future expansion of the city and to restore the battered self-confidence of the people of the city. Surpris-ingly, most of these objectives were reached. The Context Context is all-important in the explanation of townscape. The absence of self-government in Newfoundland between 1934 and 1949 is one critical factor in the Churchill Park story. During these 15 years, the country was run by a Commission of Government appointed by, and answerable to, the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs in London (Hiller 1993). Three of the six commissioners and the governor were English, while the remaining three Commissioners were Newfoundlanders. Had Newfoundland enjoyed responsible government during the war years rather than a 'benign oligarchy' (Rowe 1980, 417), it is probable that Churchill Park would not have been built (Winter 1999). A second factor was the changing world view of Newfoundlanders during the early 1940s. The traditional attachment to Britain was replaced by a new attachment to the prosperous North America to which they were being introduced (Jackon 1986). …

Condominiums: An investment decision or lifestyle choice?

In Canada, condominiums provide a unique opportunity to invest in residential real estate. Each owner holds individual title to a condominium unit while sharing ownership of common facilities. Maintenance and operating costs for the common facilities are paid through a corporation that contracts these tasks, relieving owners of individual responsibility. Easy maintenance, combined with the traditional appeal of real estate investments, has encouraged many buyers to invest in condominiums for financial gain rather than for shelter. Thus, the condominium market is ideal for examining how investment considerations are altering tenure decisions. Until recently, researchers and policy makers emphasized the important influence of use value on tenure decisions. For example, large households and households with children are expected to opt for homeownership whenever finances permit. Ideally, these households purchase housing to obtain a single-detached house that provides adequate indoor space, easy access to the outdoors, and the privacy and independence of ownership (Michelson, 1977; Morris and Winter, 1978). In contrast, smaller households, particularly young adults and the elderly, are expected to opt for rental apartments. Typically, these offer low maintenance and easy access to shopping and recreation facilities. Attention is now being given to the role of exchange value or investment considerations in the decision to buy or rent housing. There is a growing body of survey data attesting to the public's belief that housing is a good financial investment (Agnew, 1981; Baer, 1986; Pratt, 1986). This belief has been encouraged by public policy that provides favourable tax treatment of homeownership, low-cost financing, and in some countries, outright production subsidies (Ball, Harloe and Martens, 1988). For example, in the United States, Great Britain, and Sweden, mortgage interest is tax deductible, while in Canada and the United States, capital gains from one's principal residence largely escape taxation (Ball, Harloe and Martens, 1988). In Canada, real estate investors pay capital gains taxes when they sell property, but they may deduct mortgage interest, maintenance costs and

Cross-Cultural Study of Home Buying Behavior: Single-Detached Home Buyers In Indiana And Nova Scotia

This study examines the salient selection criteria and purchase behavior of Novia Scotia and Indiana buyers of single-detached houses. The study considers features of the house and economic and locational factors deemed important by recent home buyers in making the home-buying decision.