Search results

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the determinants of the affordable housing shortage in the Greater Kuala Lumpur from the suppliers’ perspectives.

Primary data were collected through a cross-sectional survey questionnaire comprising 21 determinants and 111 experts in the housing industry.

The affordable housing shortages are consequences of regulations and policies on land allocations, building materials and the affordable housing market. The government should provide more lands to the developers or the government should directly build affordable housing on their lands. To lower the cost of construction, the government should reduce the importation tax and procedures, and the housing industry should find alternative building materials.

Theoretically, the research provided fresh insights into the causes of housing shortages and reasons for the increase in housing prices. The results will be useful to policymakers towards affordable housing delivery and to the developers and contractors on measures to increase profit margins and increase housing supply.

There have been complaints and criticisms of the conditions and performance of university buildings in Malaysia. The purpose of this paper is to report research looking into building maintenance practices in Malaysia.

To achieve its objectives, the research combined a literature review and a case study. The case study aimed to provide a details and factual information on the maintenance procedures of a university.

It was found that the maintenance procedures on the case studied were corrective and budget driven. It was also found that the university favours out‐sourcing to in‐sourcing their maintenance service.

The findings of this study are based on a case, therefore the findings may not represent the maintenance practices of other public universities in Malaysia or elsewhere.

Some universities may adopt some of the good maintenance practices of the university studied. Some of the observations could be helpful to other universities striving to achieve best maintenance practices.

The paper is able to expose the weakness in university maintenance practices in Malaysia and outlines some positive attributes.

Defect management is an important segment in building maintenance management. Although defect management requires systemic approach, the purpose of this paper is to focus on the measurement of defects in university buildings based on user perspective.

The paper reviews related literature and presents the outcome of a survey of 550 university buildings users, derived from a convenience sample from five universities.

A total of 20 defects were found to be very critical to the building users. Faulty electrical systems, faulty air conditioning system and roof damages were the defects requiring urgent maintenance. Based on the findings, it was concluded that resources be directed towards defects that affect security, safety and comfort.

The list of 32 defects may not be exhaustive, but are indicative of defects that affect university building performance. Because the buildings are not prototypes, some of the findings required adaptation. The conclusions were based on data from five universities.

This study is useful to maintenance organizations in efforts to increase users’ satisfaction, productivity and building performance by guiding resources allocation and at the same time reducing rework, dissatisfaction and waste. The findings would provide feedback and feed forward information and knowledge to the design and construction teams. The study provides a platform to integrate maintenance issues into the design and construction phases of building projects.

There is no such conclusive study on the maintenance of university buildings. Both academics and practitioners can apply the findings to their respective maintenance management scenarios.

The purpose of this paper is to present an algorithm of procedures intended for use in building maintenance management (BMM), called SIAPME.

With basis on a literature review, an exploratory practical exercise was carried out, drawing up the SIAPME model and comprising several organisational charts with interconnections.

This study offers an overview of an alternative set of well-founded and integrated strategies for asset management. Overall, the basic characteristics of the outlined model seem to be in agreement with various existing models.

SIAPME’s ambitious goal is to serve as a well-founded strategic basis for the development of an advanced software solution. However, it still lacks empirical validation, which could be a lengthy process.

This research can provide a valuable input for a more in-depth discussion on the identification and correction of gaps for many systems currently in use. For instance, it is believed that an eventual SIAPME software solution may have potential for full compatibility with building information models, particularly focusing on the life cycle phase of utilisation, operation and building maintenance.

Through SIAPME procedures, a building manager will be allowed to have a very broad perspective of its functions, covering nearly all the fundamental aspects for efficient and integrated maintenance, with optimal control of all players in the process. As a concept idea and by introducing emerging and technological issues, the model can be advantageous for BMM.

There have been claims of inadequate maintenance practice in Tanzania’s higher learning institutions (HLIs), primarily due to the traditional conventional approach where maintenance is only addressed during the usage stage. This study aimed to investigate whether universities and colleges are adopting a holistic approach to maintenance, where it is considered from the inception stage.

Structured questionnaires and semi-structured interviews were employed to gather quantitative and qualitative data, respectively. Through purposive sampling, 11 estate managers were selected, with eight of them responding to questionnaires. A comprehensive literature review was also conducted. Quantitative data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (IBM SPSSTM) Version 20.0, while qualitative data were examined using Nvivo 12 Plus and in-depth analysis.

The study revealed that, maintenance in HLIs is only marginally considered in a holistic manner. In cases where it is “considered,” this is often by default rather than by design. This has led to maintenance challenges, such as the accelerated deterioration of components, the incompatibility of new maintenance materials with the old ones and difficulties in adapting spaces to meet emerging user requirements. The most frequently occurring words in the word cloud, “considered” and “maintenance”, underscore the necessity of adopting a holistic approach to maintenance management.

The study was confined to HLIs in the Dar es Salaam region.

The findings from this study offer valuable insights for maintenance experts implementing holistic approaches in Tanzanian universities and colleges. Top management should focus on proper planning (including maintenance plans and budgets) and decision-making regarding maintenance management. Additionally, the Government of Tanzania may consider implementing policies requiring designing teams to adopt a holistic approach to maintenance before approving building permits.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine whether universities and colleges consider maintenance from a holistic perspective.

Facilities management (FM) plays a key role in the performance of businesses to ensure the comfort of users and the sustainable use of natural resources over operation and maintenance. Nevertheless, reactive maintenance (RM) services are characterised by delays, waste and difficulties in prioritising services and identifying the root causes of failures; this is mostly caused by inefficient asset information and communication management. While linking building information modelling and the Internet of Things through a digital twin has demonstrated potential for improving FM practices, there is a lack of evidence regarding the process requirements involved in their implementation. This paper aims to address this challenge, as it is the first to statistically characterise RM services and processes to identify the most critical RM problems and scenarios for digital twin implementation. The statistical data analytics approach also constitutes a novel practical approach for a holistic analysis of RM occurrences.

The research strategy was based on multiple case studies, which adopted university campuses as objects for investigation. A detailed literature review of work to date and documental analysis assisted in generating data on the FM sector and RM services, where qualitative and statistical analyses were applied to approximately 300,000 individual work requests.

The work provides substantial evidence of a series of patterns across both cases that were not evidenced prior to this study: a concentration of requests within main campuses; a balanced distribution of requests per building, mechanical and electrical service categories; a predominance of low priority level services; a low rate of compliance in attending priority services; a cumulative impact on the overall picture of five problem subcategories (i.e. Building-Door, Mechanical-Plumbing, Electrical-Lighting, Mechanical-Heat/Cool/Ventilation and Electrical-Power); a predominance of problems in student accommodation facilities, circulations and offices; and a concentration of requests related to unlisted buildings. These new patterns form the basis for business cases where maintenance services and FM sectors can benefit from digital twins. It also provides a new methodological approach for assessing the impact of RM on businesses.

The findings provide new insights for owners and FM staff in determining the criticality of RM services, justifying investments and planning the digital transformation of services for a smarter provision.

This study represents a unique approach to FM and provides detailed evidence to identify novel RM patterns of critical service provision and activities within organisations for efficient digitalised data management over a building’s lifecycle.

Effective building maintenance management is vital for reducing the impact of building defects and costly building maintenance work. Such practice significantly contributes to the public sector in terms of cost reduction, improved effectiveness and efficiency in maintenance works, increasing safety and well-being of the occupants, expanding the life of building stocks and expanding the value of investment for the government building assets. The maintenance practice in Malaysia is still emerging in comparison to many developed nations. The purpose of this study is to determine the current scenario of the building maintenance approach at the design stage in public buildings in Malaysia.

An extensive questionnaire survey was held, involving 312 key players (38 per cent out of 820 predetermined participants) in Malaysia.

The analysis showed that building maintenance in public building in Malaysia still uses the reactive approach. Despite the Malaysian Government’s adoption of a proactive maintenance approach, unfortunately, there are some misunderstandings among the key players regarding the approach. The research results demonstrate that the key players had a lack of understanding on the concept of the proactive maintenance management approach and that they were either ignorant or had insufficient awareness of proactive maintenance approach.

The contribution of this study is useful for the government to adopt a more proactive building maintenance policy at the design stage, to give awareness on proactive building maintenance to the key players in their construction project and as a guide to the key players to adopt a maintenance plan at the design stage of work.

To achieve efficient operation and maintenance (O&M) management, this study seeks to identify critical success factors (CSFs) affecting service delivery factors of O&M services at stratified residential buildings. The purpose of this study is to yield measurable data for developing an effective O&M framework to enhancing its performance. In future research, this study will further investigate the relationship between the CSF and service performance factors.

This study adopts a combination of qualitative and quantitative techniques that yields conclusive study findings while improving the research’s validity and dependability. Two series of instruments were conducted in an effort to refine the efficient O&M framework variables. Instruments used in addressing the research gap were a questionnaire survey and focus group discussion (FGD). Analysis of data was completed via the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) programme for quantitative data and thematic analysis for qualitative data.

This study concludes that the CSFs directly affect the performance of O&M. Questionnaire survey and FGD findings have refined the CSF into three main categories, namely, building characteristics, O&M management and community participation. FGD experts further suggested that service performance factors can be measured against SERVQUAL service qualities such as reliability, tangible, responsiveness, assurance and empathy.

Future research may consider the inclusion of financial elements in the O&M service delivery.

This study presents a fresh insight into the CSFs that construct an efficient O&M framework through rigorous steps of data collection and analysis. This study proposes impactful guidance for policymakers, practitioners and residents on the significance of all parties’ involvement to support the management of residential buildings, where the current practice of O&M constantly faces complex issues. This study derives novice strategies that should correspond to the growing issues and challenges in managing residential buildings. The deeper insight into the role of O&M represents a direction for the future development of facilities management progress and stratified residential building sectors.

In recent years, there have been many concerns about issues surrounding building maintenance, which are continually increasing. However, there is a lack of comprehensive studies on building maintenance issues, their effects and the way forward. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to carry out a comprehensive review of building maintenance issues, their effects and the way forward. It also aims to develop a conceptual model that can support future research.

A systematic review of the literature published from 2009 to 2019 was carried out. Five relevant databases were searched, based on this study's search terms, and a narrative synthesis of the results from the included studies was carried out. Studies were eligible for inclusion if they fulfilled the inclusion criteria of this systematic review.

This study has identified and classified building maintenance issues, their effects and the way forward, and also developed a conceptual model that demonstrates the association between issues, their effects and the way forward. The way forward of the conceptual model focuses on effective management, technical capability, development of human resources and cost optimisation.

This paper addresses an important topic: the aspect in which it differs from existing studies is that, in the latter, the researchers studied a single sub-issue, whereas this systematic review includes a comprehensive study of building maintenance issues. Furthermore, this review has demonstrated how the way forward can moderate issues and their effects.