AN INVESTIGATION INTO TENANT ORGANIZATIONS' WILLINGNESS-TO-PAY FOR THE INTANGIBLE VALUE-ADDED BENEFITS OF SUSTAINABLE BUILDINGS: CASE STUDY IN SINGAPORE

Abstract

This research aims to understand the demand for sustainable buildings by investigating the tenant organizations' willingness-to-pay (WTP) behavior towards the value-added benefits (VABs). Tenant organizations refer to tenants operating in office buildings on tenancy agreement. Six groups of factors of tenant organizations' WTP for the VABs are identified: (1) Organization Characteristics, (2) Current Premises, (3) Building Characteristics, (4) Satisfaction of the VABs Experienced, (5) Perception, and (6) Knowledge of Sustainability Issues, Building Sustainability Rating Systems and Building Impacts. A survey was conducted on the tenant organizations operating in office buildings located in the city area of Singapore. The hypothesized relationship between the tenant organizations' WTP for the VABs and its factors were tested using a series of statistical techniques on the data collected from the survey. It is found that older tenant organizations tend to have lower WTP for the VABs of improved health and comfort of their employees. Generally, tenant organizations also have demand for sustainable buildings mainly due to the positive organizational image that sustainable buildings help to project. In addition, it is found that the current building sustainability rating systems are inadequate for communicating the sustainability benefits to building occupants and for achieving building sustainability. Lastly, the investigation reveals that the use of sustainable technologies is not as important as how the building is being managed during its operational stage for ensuring building sustainability performance. The findings from this study are useful for channeling the sustainability efforts of the building industry to more effective areas.