| Author: | Wong, Kin Yip |
| Title: | A spatial data analysis of religious places and their impacts on the nearby residential property values in Hong Kong |
| Advisors: | Chan, W. M. Daniel (BRE) |
| Degree: | DIREC |
| Year: | 2024 |
| Subject: | Religious architecture -- China -- Hong Kong Real property -- Prices -- China -- Hong Kong Residential real estate -- China -- Hong Kong Hong Kong Polytechnic University -- Dissertations |
| Department: | Department of Building and Real Estate |
| Pages: | 224 pages : color illustrations |
| Language: | English |
| Abstract: | This is an executive summary of a part-time professional doctoral research study that was completed in April 2024 about the location of religious places and their nearby residential property values in Hong Kong. Religious buildings are part of the real estate fabric. By utilizing a quantitative research approach and a combination of spatial data and statistical methods, this study aims to address an existing knowledge gap in the scientific literature pertaining to the economic impact of religious externality and its effect on residential property values in Hong Kong. The investigation was two folds with data collection occurring in either part. First, extracting the latest geographic information and data from the government digital maps. It examined the distribution of 2,005 recorded religious places in a local context via a statistical cluster analysis. The search findings advocated that most religious places in Hong Kong are concentrated in urban areas of Hong Kong Island and Kowloon Peninsula. It seemed that there are spatial autocorrelations in their localities. Later, it considers the essential factors that affect Christians, Buddhists and Taoists religious sites by geographically weighted regression analysis. The analysis revealed that spatial dependence is prevalent in the age and educational factors of Buddhist and Taoist religious sites in Hong Kong. Second, in order to validate the results of spatial data analysis, an online self-administered questionnaire survey was conducted via Qualtrics from November 2022 to April 2023. The results of the survey indicated that around 10% of Christians would like to live near a church place adjacent to their religious leaders. Many responses stated that the noise and smell of religious events would be a disturbance to their personal lives. It was revealed that the religious activities that take place in the vicinity would have an exogenous effect on the property price. The study also questioned the participants' attitudes towards online worship and their concerns regarding the cost of attending an in-person religious ceremony. Results from the questionnaire survey were reviewed by a professor at Center of Humanity Buddhism of the Chinese University of Hong Kong and considered to be reliable and valid through a series of statistical tests. A personal interview with the same professor opined that religious cluster would have positive impact on the society and attributed to property value. To validate the questionnaire responses and interview findings, an experimental model with latent and observable variables was constructed using exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis by means of SPSS AMOS software program. The results advocated that viewing on churches, Taoist temples, Buddha, or Chinese Tinhau deities from home scene is associated with housing decision. The confirmatory factor analysis results finally postulated that nearby churches, Buddhist monasteries, mosques, and Hindu temples have positive influence on home price. To verify the hypothetical model, a case study was undertaken to identify potential residential developments in Hong Kong that are affected by an independent religious place nearby and within a religious cluster. Altogether 8,598 residential properties were identified by GIS layer screening and 28 of them were selected for an empirical assessment using the Hedonic pricing model. After an on-site inspection of the religious sites was taken place, 7 residential developments are eventually shortlisted for conducting the empirical test. The results of the hedonic pricing model indicated that religious attributes including a church that is 100 meters away and development located in a significant religious (Christian) cluster in Hong Kong would have positive impact on the price of nearby residential properties. The derived findings of this study have significant contributions to property appraisal, development site feasibility study and real estate economics research in respect of externalities of religious places. This study ascertained that artistic church architecture would have an enhancement of home scene and not offensive to the domestic. Also, established religious community provides economic benefit to its surrounding residential properties. Nonetheless, the research framework and methodology adopted in this study can be replicated to investigate and compare religious influence on other economies or countries. A spatial data analysis of the location of religious places in Taiwan revealed similar spatial correlations to Christian, Buddhist, and Taoist facilities in Hong Kong. Finally, this study could be further improved by expanding the data sample size and including religious sites within sub-divided premises. It is also worth further research on comparing the economic and social impact of Eastern and Western places of worship on Hong Kong communities. |
| Rights: | All rights reserved |
| Access: | restricted access |
Files in This Item:
| File | Description | Size | Format | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7630.pdf | For All Users (off-campus access for PolyU Staff & Students only) | 6.64 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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