To study the causes and implications of subdivision of housing units to the community of Hong Kong

Abstract

The issue of “subdivided units” has aroused the attention of general public in recent times. It commonly refers to individual living apartments being subdivided into two or more smaller flats for rental purpose. These subdivided housing are often existed in old buildings with crowded living condition, poor hygiene standards and lack of fire safety facilities, which have therefore posed health and safety hazards to thousands of their residents who have no alternatives but to endure this poor living environment due to the financial limitations. In view of the growing public concern towards the issue of subdivided units due to the happening of several tragic cases in recent years involving subdivision of apartments, the government has announced the proposal of a licensing scheme or landlord registration system in early September, 2013 for regulating the safety and hygiene situations of subdivided flats. By examining the current condition of the subdivision of housing units in Hong Kong, the goal of this study is to explore the underlying causes of the subdivision of flats and the implications of this housing issue to the community of Hong Kong. In order to do so, the study first explains the development of subdivided housing in Hong Kong, including the brief history of urban development and housing policy of Hong Kong resulting to subdivision of units, and the development of subdivided housing in the global context is also covered. The environment of subdivided flats is also studied in details, including their building structures, fire safety facilities and environmental hygiene conditions. Then the conceptual framework of the study is going to be discussed, which is to investigate the reasons contributing to the emergence of subdivided units in Hong Kong, in which this study is focused on examining the relationship of “market failure” of housing market and the emergence of subdivided units in Hong Kong. Questionnaire survey is done on the tenants living in subdivided units, which both legal and illegal subdivided units are covered in the survey, whereas an in-depth interview is conducted on the landlord operating the rental business of subdivided dwellings. The next chapter describes and analyses the findings of the survey and in-depth interview. The perspectives of the stakeholders including tenants and landlord of subdivided flats are revealed on their reasons of living in and operating the business of subdivided housing, their evaluation of the living conditions and safety of subdivided flats, their feedbacks towards the Licensing Scheme of subdivided units proposed by government as well as their recommendations for resolving the problem of subdivided flats. The conceptual framework – the relationship of “market failure” phenomenon of housing market and the emergence of subdivided units in Hong Kong will also be discussed based on the analyzed data. Finally, this study ends with the implication that the emergence of subdivided housing is contributing to multi-factors, such as lack of public rental housing units, geographical proximity and astronomically high housing prices. However, among these factors, market failure is considered as the dominant factor of driving the residents, especially lower class to select residing in subdivided dwellings. In view of the analysis result, recommendations are made for assisting policy makers to resolve the subdivided housing problem in Hong Kong.