A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio...

Page 1 of 18

A study of tenants' maintenance awareness,

responsibility and satisfaction in institutional
housing in Nigeria.
Author: Oladapo, Adebayo A.
Geographic Code: 6NIGR
Date: Oct 1, 2006
Words: 7523
Publication: International Journal of Strategic Property Management
ISSN: 1648-715X

ABSTRACT. The housing problem in Nigeria is both quantitative and qualitative. The
qualitative aspect, which has to do with the maintenance of the existing stock, has
assumed greater significance because of the need to preserve the existing stock and
bring it to acceptable standards of living. Tenants in institutional housing are major
stakeholders who directly bear the brunt of the disrepair of the houses. Hence they
have a role to play to optimise the maintenance of their houses within the very limited
resources available to the maintenance departments. The study was carried out to
evaluate the maintenance awareness and responsibilities of tenants and quantitatively
analyse their satisfaction with the state of maintenance of their houses. The results
showed that the tenants had a high level of maintenance awareness and responsibility
but their satisfaction with the maintenance of their houses was just average.

KEYWORDS: Maintenance; Institutional housing; Tenant issues; Nigeria

SANTRAUKA

KA NIGERIJOS GYVENTOJAI ZINO APIE INSTITUCIJU BUSTU PRIEZIURA,

KOKS JU ATSAKOMYBES LYGIS IR KAIP JUOS TENKINA SIE BUSTAI

Adebayo A. OLADAPO

Nigerijoje busto problema yra ir kiekybine, ir kokybine. Kokybinis aspektas, susijes su

turimu istekliu prieziura, tapo svarbesnis kilus poreikiui issaugoti ir sutvarkyti turimus
isteklius, kad jie atitiktu priimtinus gyvenimo standartus. Instituciju bustu gyventoju yra
gana daug, jie tiesiogiai patiria nesuremontuotu bustu nepatogumu. Taigi jie
suinteresuoti prisideti prie namu prieziuros optimizavimo, nors tam naudojami labai
riboti prieziuros departamentu istekliai. Siekiant ivertinti, ka is tiesu gyventojai zino apie
prieziura ir koks ju atsakomybes lygis, bei kiekybiskai isanalizuoti ju pasitenkinima
namu prieziuros bukle, buvo atliktas tyrimas. Rezultatai parode, kad gyventojai yra
labai atsakingi ir daug zino apie busto prieziura, bet ju pasitenkinimas namu prieziura
tera vidutinis.

1. INTRODUCTION

Housing is universally acknowledged as the second most essential human need after
food and is a major economic asset in every nation. This fact is underscored by a
statement in the foreword to Foster's (2000) report that "Good quality housing provides

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 2 of 18

the foundations for stable communities and social inclusion". So and Leung (2004)
have also established a positive correlation between the quality of life and the comfort,
convenience and visual appeal of houses.

A United Nations report in 1976 described the problem of housing in Africa as far from
being only technical and economic, but also a problem of social development in its
widest sense, encompassing legal, educational and community-building aspects and
directed at real human and social improvement (van Wyk and van Wyk, 2001). Indeed,
van Wyk and van Wyk (2001) made the important point that "it is apparent that the
problems of housing, urban development and economic development are closely
interrelated". They added that housing certainly has a large potential to contribute
towards providing people with 'the opportunity to live full human lives', and hence
contributes positively towards all aspects of development--psychological, social,
economic, cultural and institutional, in the individual, community and societal contexts.

Against this background, it is not surprising that since the colonial era (before
independence in 1960) successive governments in Nigeria have embarked on
programmes to provide housing for public servants. These programmes recorded very
little success, with some achieving as little as 15% of their set targets. Nigeria therefore
accumulated a housing deficit estimated at five million new units by the year 2000, the
target year of the UN's "Shelter for All" agenda. In addition, there was a backlog of
maintenance required to bring existing units to acceptable standards of living,
equivalent to the cost of three million new units (Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1991).

It is clear from the foregoing that the housing problem in Nigeria is both quantitative
and qualitative. In fact, Ozdemir (2002) regards the quality problem as the main
problem in housing and advocates that housing policies should focus not only on the
production of new housing units but also on improving the standards of the existing
stock to meet current and changing standards. The qualitative aspect of the housing
problem is the problem of maintenance. The problem of maintenance arises because
buildings inevitably deteriorate with time due to effect of various causes.

As stated earlier, research has established a positive correlation between the quality of
life of tenants and the comfort, convenience and visual appeal of houses. These
attributes of a house, no doubt, are a function of its state of maintenance. This is
because the essence of maintenance, by definition, is to keep a building in a condition
appropriate to its use (El-Haram and Horner, 2002). The implication of this reality is that
tenants have a very high stake in the maintenance of their houses, whether they are
responsible for the maintenance or not. In fact, Bitner et al. (1997) believe that in the
provision of services (like housing maintenance and repairs), the customers (including
tenants) have vital roles to play in creating service outcomes to ultimately determine
the value and level of satisfaction they receive. It is for this reason that this study aimed
at assessing tenants' maintenance awareness and responsibility as well as their level
of satisfaction with the maintenance of their houses.

To achieve the stated aim of this study, the following research questions were raised:

* What is tenants' level of understanding of the concept of maintenance?

* In what ways do tenants contribute to the state of maintenance of their houses?

* How do tenants prioritise competing maintenance demands?

* What is the tenants' level of satisfaction with the state of maintenance of their

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 3 of 18

houses?

The following hypotheses were formulated and tested to seek answers to some of the
research questions:

1. Null hypothesis ([H.sub.0]): There is no agreement among tenants in their

maintenance priority preferences.

Alternative hypothesis ([H.sub.1]): There is agreement among tenants in their

maintenance priority preferences.

2. Null hypothesis ([H.sub.0]): There is no significant difference between the

maintenance priority preferences of tenants and the maintenance departments.

Alternative hypothesis ([H.sub.1]): There is significant difference in the maintenance

priority preferences of tenants and the maintenance departments.

3. Null hypothesis ([H.sub.1]): There is no agreement among tenants in their

satisfaction rating of the level of maintenance of their houses.

Alternative hypothesis ([H.sub.1]): There is agreement among tenants in their

satisfaction rating of the level of maintenance of their houses.

4. Null hypothesis ([H.sub.0]): There is no significant correlation between users'

perception of the level of maintenance of a particular building and the prevalent level of
user satisfaction.

Alternative hypothesis ([H.sub.1]): There is significant correlation between users'

perception of the level of maintenance of a particular building and the prevalent level of
user satisfaction.

2. INSTITUTIONAL HOUSING IN NIGERIA

As a deliberate strategy, Nigeria's housing policies have over the years encouraged
employers of labour in both the public and private sectors to provide housing for their
workers. Thus in addition to barracks accommodation for the armed forces, the police
and other paramilitary organisations, institutions like the Nigerian Railways, educational
institutions (especially the universities) and even multinational oil companies, etc. have
developed large housing estates for their employees.

Most of Nigeria's universities operate the residential system by which housing

accommodation is provided for both students and staff on campus. Over the years
these institutions have developed large housing estates, which are among the largest
estates in the country in terms of land areas and number of units. Unlike most others
(in both the public and private sectors), the university housing estates have well-
organised technical departments responsible for the maintenance of the houses. For
this reason and the fact that the university housing maintenance organisations are
more accessible to researchers than most others, three large university housing
estates having a total of 1357 units were selected for this study.

3. TENANTS' ROLES AND SATISFACTION IN HOUSING MAINTENANCE

Building users generate maintenance in two major ways. First, their normal use of
buildings results in natural wear and tear as envisaged in the building design and

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 4 of 18

specification. Second, their abuse of buildings, especially through vandalism, results in

wilful damage to a building. Another way is perhaps what Olubodun (1996) called
passive vandalism, which is wilful neglect of affordable maintenance responsibility by a
user. This no doubt leads to further deterioration of the building condition and
generates more maintenance. In their study of local authority housing in Scotland, El-
Haram and Horner (2002) identified tenant factors like high expectation of tenants,
improper use of the property and delay in reporting failures as very significant
contributors to housing maintenance costs.

The primary initiators of maintenance action are the building owner and/or tenants,
although such other interested parties as building inspectors, insurance companies,
employees and their trade unions and concerned members of the public directly or
indirectly exert some influence on the amount of maintenance work undertaken. A
building owner normally seeks to preserve the condition of his property by the insertion
of appropriate clauses in the lease/tenancy agreement to demarcate owner/ user
responsibilities for maintenance. In some countries such demarcations are laid down by
statute. For example, in the UK, section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act of 1985
provides that in any lease for less than seven years, the landlord shall be responsible
for repairing the structure and exterior of the building as well as the mechanical and
electrical installations (Lee, 1995).

Whatever the owner/user demarcation of maintenance responsibility, the user has a

primary responsibility to notify defects to the appropriate quarters for remedial action.
Seeley (1987) identified six commonly used means of notification by users as follows:

* Telephone call from tenant;

* Return of pre-paid complaint card by tenant;

* Letter from tenant;

* Officer of housing authority finding defects;

* Tenant notifying defect in person at a depot or housing office;

* Tenant notifying complaint to officer of housing authority on site.

Kangwa and Olubodun (2003b) are of the view that owner-occupiers must have an
understanding or knowledge of the severity of the defects observed or anticipated in
their dwelling structures. This view, no doubt, should also apply to tenants.
Unfortunately, however, lack of awareness among homeowners and tenants remains a
barrier to prompt notification of defects as most home owners/tenants face difficulties in
recognising the symptoms of even the most basic forms of building decay (Kangwa and
Olubodun, 2003a). The reporting delay time is the time which elapses between the
detection/observance of a defect and report to the maintenance department by the
user. This depends mainly on the inconvenience which the defects cause the user and
is not a measure of the seriousness of the defect (Lee, 1995). Lack of maintenance
awareness prevents tenants from identifying in time the relative value and urgency of a
repair (Richardson, 1991) and also manifests in the wrong notion that housing
deterioration has no impact on tenants' standard of living (Kangwa and Olubodun,
2003a).

Users also have a role in evaluating the effectiveness of maintenance management

systems to provide feedback to maintenance managers. This is usually done in post-

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 5 of 18

occupancy evaluations which measure user satisfaction as an indicator of a building's

utility. This system very often excludes building users from the early design decision-
making process. McGeorge and Betts (1990) have expressed the view that, in addition
to post-occupancy evaluation, a pre-occupancy stakeholder analysis could enhance the
utility of a building to the user particularly in the area of maintenance planning. There is
no doubt that the end user must inevitably bear some of the consequences of errors in
planning. The cost of such errors to the user could be in terms of higher maintenance
costs or health hazards.

Two categories of stakeholders, namely owners and users are identified in the normal
convention for stakeholder analysis. In the context of housing there could be some
overlap between these two categories. Hence McGeorge and Betts (1990) have
cautioned that making a distinction between them could be counterproductive. There is
no doubt, however, that stakeholders in housing are likely to have conflicting
objectives, which a pre-occupancy evaluation can help to balance.

Tenant Satisfaction in Housing

Housing satisfaction refers to the degree of contentment experienced by an individual

or family with regard to the current housing situation (McCray and Day, cited in
Djebarni and Al-Abed, 2000). It is an index of the level of contentment with current
housing conditions, and refers to an entire continuum of satisfaction from "very
dissatisfied" to "very satisfied" rather than just a state of being "satisfied" (Morris, cited
in Djebarni and Al-Abed, 2000).

Housing is more than shelter and the habitability of a house depends not only on the
physical characteristics of the dwelling but also on the social, cultural and
behavioural characteristics of the users. This is why Lu (1999) has expressed the view
that housing satisfaction is not only an important component of individuals' quality of life
but also determines the way they respond to the residential environment. A dwelling
that is adequate from the physical or design point of view may not necessarily be
adequate or satisfactory from the users' point of view (Onibokun, cited in Oladapo,
2005). On this basis, according to Oladapo (2005), he advocated a systems approach
to the concept of user satisfaction involving four interacting subsystems-the tenant
subsystem, the dwelling subsystem, the environment subsystem and the management
subsystem (Figure 1).

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

The model in Figure 1 depicts a system of tenant-dwelling unit-environment-

management interaction which produces a housing situation which the tenant
component judges as adequate and satisfactory according to his housing needs and
expectations. Djebarni and Al-Abed (2000) have combined the adequacy and
satisfaction requirements into a housing effectiveness model.

At the heart of the user satisfaction model in Figure 1 is the tenant (the fourth
subsystem) who is the recipient of all the feedback from the other subsystems and is
therefore the central focus of the model on which satisfaction in housing management
should be based. In this model, the housing unit is a part of an environment and must
of necessity interact with the environment subsystem which has influence, negative or
positive, on the inhabitants' living conditions and their satisfaction with a particular
housing unit within an environment. There is also the management subsystem which
comprises the whole institutional framework under which public housing is
administered.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 6 of 18

As stated earlier, housing is more than shelter. Hence, according to Ukoha and
Beamish (1997), "simply providing housing units does not measure the success of
housing programs in either developed or developing countries. The suitability of the
living environment to the needs of the residents is essential for housing programmes to
be judged successful". In their research on public housing in Abuja, Nigeria, Ukoha and
Beamish found that the management dimension (including maintenance) was the
primary source of dissatisfaction among tenants. Measuring housing satisfaction is
important because, according to Lu (1999), an understanding of the factors that make a
tenant satisfied or dissatisfied can play a critical role in formulating successful housing
policies.

From the literature, the indicators of tenant satisfaction with housing maintenance are
summarised as:

* Procedure for requesting repairs (Koebel and Etuk, 1998);

* The courtesy of the maintenance staff (Koebel and Etuk, 1998);

* Speed of response and execution by maintenance staff (Koebel and Etuk, 1998;
Rosenbaum et al., 1998; National Housing Federation, 2001);

* Level of mess and nuisance caused by maintenance staff (National Housing

Federation, 2001);

* The quality of work done by maintenance staff (National Housing Federation, 2001);

* Overall maintenance of the houses (National Housing Federation, 2001).

Examining a maintenance management system using these indicators permits a

comprehensive survey of the satisfaction of tenants with the system. However, in the
light of the criticisms of tenant satisfaction surveys in housing by several authors,
including Satsangi and Kearns (1992) and Koebel and Etuk (1998), a fundamental
problem arises as to whether tenant satisfaction surveys can be used to judge
maintenance management performance. Indeed, Satsangi and Kearns (1992) argued
that conventional tenant satisfaction surveys which set out to measure tenants'
satisfaction with service provided often end up measuring factors independent of the
provider's performance. They further argued that "the use of the satisfaction score as
an indicator of the effectiveness of the service provider, without taking into account the
likely impact of other factors upon the rating, is highly misleading". To overcome some
of these limitations, they advocated more reliable measures of tenants' satisfaction
which should take into account that (a) not all consumers are likely to have perfect
information; (b) degrees of satisfaction vary for different individuals in different
circumstances; (c) most housing services have no absolute criteria of judgment; (d)
judgment of service quality (and degree of satisfaction) are subjective, and dependent
upon culture, social identity, etc.

In spite of these criticisms, however, the fact still remains that no better alternative has
been found to tenant satisfaction surveys. Even its most ardent critics recognise some
of its merits and can only suggest modifications as demonstrated by Satsangi and
Kearns (1992). In fact, Ngo (1990) has stated that the degree of user satisfaction is one
of the indicators of the level to which a building has been maintained. Several other
researchers, including Amole (1989), Walters (1999) and Foster (2000) have supported
this view. This makes tenants' satisfaction a good measure of housing maintenance

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 7 of 18

performance.

4. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

A questionnaire survey of three university housing estates was carried out between
February and June 2004. The estates, which are among the largest in institutional
housing in Nigeria, had a combined total of 1357 units. Of the 1310 units occupied at
the time of the survey, every other house in an estate was chosen. This represented a
simple random sample size of 5%. The questions were framed to test the tenants'
appreciation of the need for maintenance, and elicit responses on their responsibilities
and priority preferences, as well as their satisfaction with the maintenance state of their
houses. Borrowing from the suggestions of Varady and Carrozza (2000) for a proper
measure of tenant satisfaction, the questionnaire covered different components of
satisfaction with housing maintenance and elicited both quantitative and qualitative
information from the respondents.

The questionnaires were personally administered by trained research assistants to the

head of each selected household. Most of the questions used Likert type scales to elicit
respondents' perceptions. To minimise the problem of leniency, central tendency and
the "halo effect" associated with such scales, the survey instrument adopted a seven-
point scale (after Walker, 1994). Thus the responses ranged from strongly disagree = 1
to strongly agree = 7. The significant agreement or otherwise with the notion being
tested was determined by adopting the mid-point value of the index (that is 4 = unsure)
as the hypothesized mean (Coakes and Steed, 2001). This implies that any result
significantly different from this uncommitted or unsure value was assumed to be either
positive or negative to the notion being tested (Pullin and Haidar, 2003). To test the
reliability of the questionnaires used in this study, the Cronbach's [sigma] values were
calculated (using the SPSS package) for the 7--point scale and found to be very high
between 0.80 and 0.89.

The data were analysed with the SPSS software using the percentile method, Kendall's
coefficient of concordance, the Mann-Whitney test and severity index analysis. The
formula for the severity index is given as follows by Elhag and Boussabaine (1999):

[MATHEMATICAL EXPRESSION NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII],

where: S.I. is the severity index; [f.sub.i] is the frequency of response; [w.sub.i] is the
weight for each rating (i.e. rating in scale/number of points in a scale), and n is the total
number of responses. The value ([f.sub.i] x 100)/n is the valid percentage as computed
by SPSS.

5. ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION OF RESULTS

Of the 655 questionnaires distributed, 406 were returned. This represents a response
rate of 61.98%, which is very good, according to Ellhag and Boussabaine (1999) and
Idrus and Newman (2002) who have expressed the view that a response rate of 30% is
good enough in construction. In addition, the 406 responses obtained gave the sample
a confidence interval better than [+ or -] 5.0 (De Vaus, 1996). The tenants' mean length
of stay in the houses was 8.44 years, which indicated that on the average the tenants
had lived in the house long enough to provide detailed information on the maintenance
history of their houses. The results are presented on tenants' maintenance awareness,
responsibility, priority preferences, performance rating of and satisfaction with the state
of maintenance of their houses.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 8 of 18

5.1. Tenants' Maintenance Awareness and Responsibility

As major stakeholders in housing maintenance, tenants are expected to understand

and appreciate the need for maintenance. In Table 1, only 8 respondents (2%) had no
idea why maintenance was necessary, while most of them (77.8%) believed that
maintenance was necessary to keep the house safe for habitation. This high level of
maintenance awareness may encourage tenants to respond promptly to the detection
of defects in their houses. In fact, Table 2 shows that more than a quarter (28.6%)
report faults promptly while about half (44.5%) even fix minor faults themselves.

The high level of maintenance awareness and responsibility demonstrated by the

tenants is reflected in the fact that 50.7% of the respondents believed that it was their
duty to use the houses with care while only a negligible number 1.7% felt it was none of
their business to contribute. Some tenants were even prepared to do some
maintenance work themselves (44.6%) or provide materials when the maintenance
department did not have them (30.8%).

5.2. Tenants' Priority Preferences

All over the world, the dwindling resources available for maintenance (including
Housing maintenance) in the face of ever-increasing maintenance demands requires
that maintenance needs be prioritised to achieve the best value for money
(Ramamurthy, 1990; Berger et al., 1991; Shen et al., 1998; Vijverberg, 2000).
Traditionally, maintenance prioritisation has been done by maintenance departments
without considering the views of tenants. Yip (2001) has argued in favour of tenant
participation in this vital exercise to enhance tenants' satisfaction with maintenance
systems. Towing this line, tenants were asked in this study to rank 16 common building
defects in order of priority. In Table 3, the significance value of Kendall's coefficient of
concordance is 0.000 (i.e. < 0.05), indicating that there was agreement (at 5%
significance level) among the tenants in their priority preferences. These results enable
us to reject the null hypothesis that "There is no agreement among tenants in their
maintenance priority preferences" and accept the alternative that "There is agreement
among tenants in their maintenance priority preferences".

Tenants' priority preferences were then compared with those of the maintenance
departments in Table 4 to see if there was any harmony between the two. It is not
surprising that both the tenants and the maintenance staff ranked roof structure number
1, as it is apparent to both groups that a collapsed roof exposes other parts of the
building to the elements and can endanger both lives and property. On the other hand,
both wall tile failure and floor tile failure, which pose no such dangers as for collapsed
roof structures, were ranked number 16 (last) by the tenants and the maintenance
departments respectively. These rankings by the tenants also show that they have a
high level of awareness and understanding of the rationale for maintenance.

To determine whether the rankings of tenants and the maintenance departments differ
significantly, the nonparametric method of the Mann-Whitney test is applied in Table 5.
It is used to test the null hypothesis that two populations have identical distribution
functions against the alternative hypothesis that the two distribution functions differ only
with respect to location (median), if at all. The results in Table 5 indicate that only in
three defects (defect in roof structure, floor tile failure and damaged taps/stop valves)
out of the sixteen defects are there significant differences between the priority
preferences of tenants and the maintenance departments (p < 0.05 at the 5%
significance level). Therefore we accept the null hypothesis that "There is no significant
difference between the maintenance priority preferences of tenants and the

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institutio... Page 9 of 18

maintenance department" and reject the alternative hypothesis that "There are
significant differences between the maintenance priority preferences of tenants and the
maintenance department".

The fact that there is agreement among the tenants in their priority ranking of building
defects, and there is no significant difference between the tenants and the maintenance
departments in their priority preferences augurs well for the prioritisation of
maintenance works in two ways. First, agreement between tenants on the one hand
and the maintenance departments on the other ensures that the two sides do not have
conflicting expectations. Secondly, agreement among tenants themselves makes it
possible for maintenance management to fix priorities acceptable to the generality of
the tenants.

5.3. Maintenance Performance Rating and Tenants' Satisfaction

As stated earlier, the level of tenants' satisfaction is an index of maintenance

performance. For tenants' satisfaction to be used as a measure of housing
maintenance performance, it is important that tenants be in agreement in their
assessments of the various attributes of maintenance satisfaction. Also, for tenant
ratings of their satisfaction to be objective it must be based on the actual state of
maintenance of their dwellings and not on extraneous factors. To examine these
issues, two null hypotheses were postulated as follows:

* There is no agreement among tenants in their satisfaction rating of housing

maintenance management.

* There is no significant correlation between users' perception of the level of

maintenance of a particular building and the prevalent level of user satisfaction.

The first hypothesis is tested using Kendall's test of concordance (Table 6). For the
significance level p < 0.05, we reject the null hypothesis that "There is no agreement
among tenants in their satisfaction rating of housing maintenance management" and
accept the alternative hypothesis that "there is agreement among tenants in their
satisfaction rating of housing maintenance management".

With the results above we proceed in Table 7 to analyse tenants' satisfaction with the
various attributes of the housing maintenance systems, using a scale from 1 = Very
dissatisfied to 7 = Very satisfied. The results show that the quality of the environment
and surroundings is the maintenance attribute most satisfactory to the tenants while the
level of maintenance backlog is the least satisfactory. The high, unsatisfactory level of
maintenance backlog stemmed from the fact that in the past five years the
maintenance departments received just about 15% of their actual budgetary
requirements from the institutions.

Table 8 shows that out of the 391 respondents, 129 (33.1%) rated their satisfaction with
the overall maintenance of their dwellings below average while 111 (28.4%) rated it
above average. Only 14 respondents (3.6%) were "Very satisfied" while 37 (9.5%) were
"Very unsatisfied". The majority of 151 (38.6%) were only averagely satisfied.

Applying the formula for severity index (explained in the methodology) to the results in
Table 8, an overall tenant satisfaction index (TSI) of 0.55 is obtained, which on a scale
of 0 to 1 is just average.

In Table 9, the overall rating (from 1 = Very bad to 7 = Very good) of the state of

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 10 of 18

maintenance of the houses by the tenants is presented. Again, using the formula for
severity index earlier given, a state of maintenance index (SMI) of 0.57 is calculated
from the results in Table 9. The SMI is just above average on a scale of 0 to 1.

The second null hypothesis that "There is no significant correlation between users'
perception of the level of maintenance of a particular dwelling and the prevalent level of
user satisfaction" is tested in Table 10 by running Pearson's correlation between the
tenants' overall rating of the state of maintenance of their dwellings (from very bad to
very good) and their satisfaction with the overall maintenance of their dwellings.

The analysis in Table 10 indicates a positive correlation between the two variables. For
p < 0.01, the correlation is highly significant at the 1% level. Hence we reject the null
hypothesis that "There is no significant correlation between users' perception of the
level of maintenance of a particular dwelling and the prevalent level of user
satisfaction" and accept the alternative hypothesis that "There is significant correlation
between users' perception of the level of maintenance of a particular dwelling and the
prevalent level of user satisfaction". This implies that the tenant satisfaction index of
0.55 obtained represents the true level of tenant satisfaction based on the actual state
of maintenance of the dwellings and not on extraneous factors. The maintenance
departments can therefore rely on the results as feedback from the tenants to guide
their decisions to improve performance

6. CONCLUSIONS

This paper reports the results of a questionnaire survey of 406 tenants in 3 large
institutional housing estates in Nigeria. The aim of the survey was to assess tenants'
maintenance awareness and responsibility as well as their level of satisfaction with the
maintenance of their houses. The findings show that most of the tenants had the
correct understanding of the rationale for maintenance and a high sense of
responsibility towards the maintenance of their houses. This level of awareness and
responsibility may be because the tenants were highly educated people, possessing
qualifications ranging from first degrees or diplomas to doctorates in various fields.

There was agreement among the tenants on the priority order of competing repair
demands. Also, there was no significant difference in the priority preferences of the
tenants and the maintenance departments. The tenants' satisfaction with state of
maintenance of their houses was just average, with the quality of the
environment/surroundings and the backlog of maintenance work rated as the most and
the least satisfactory attributes of the maintenance systems respectively. The study
showed that tenants' perceptions of and satisfaction with the state of maintenance of
their houses was based on the actual conditions of their houses. This study should
therefore serve as a good feedback to the maintenance departments and guide them in
taking remedial measures to improve their performance and boost tenants' satisfaction.

Received 12 September 2005; accepted 22 May 2006

REFERENCES

Amole, B. (1989) Residents' assessment of the university housing estate in Ile-Ife,

Nigeria. Journal of Studies in Environmental Design in West Africa, 8, p. 19-32.

Berger, L., Greenstein, J., Hoffman, M. and Uzan, J. (1991) Practical application of
models for pavement maintenance management. Journal of Transportation

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 11 of 18

Engineering-ASCE, 117(9), p.2065-2078.

Bitner, M. J., Faranda, W. T., Hubbert, A. R. and Zeithaml, V A. (1997) Customer

contributions and roles in service delivery. International Journal of Service Industry
Management, 8(3), p. 193-205.

Coakes, S. J. and Steed, L. G. (2001) SPSS: analysis without anguish, John Wiley &
Sons, Milton, UK.

De Vaus, D. A. (1996) Surveys in social research, UCL Press, London.

Djebarni, R. and Al-Abed, A. (2000) Satisfaction level with neighbourhoods in low-

income public housing in Yemen. Property Management, 18(4), p. 230-242.

Elhag, T. M. S. and Boussabaine, A. H. (1999) Evaluation of construction cost and time

attributes, in Proc. of the 15th ARCOM Conference, Vol. 2, Liverpool John Moores
University, pp. 473-480.

El-Haram, M. A. and Homer, M. W. (2002) Factors affecting housing maintenance cost.

Journal of Quality in Maintenance Engineering, 8(2), p. 115-123.

Federal Republic of Nigeria (1991) National housing policy for Nigeria. Federal Ministry
of Works and Housing, Lagos.

Foster, A. (2000) Putting your house in order: evaluating tenant satisfaction with
improvements to social housing. Available at
http://www.hmtreasury.gov.uk/media/092FE/239.pdf [Accessed on 15 May, 2004].

Idrus, A. B. and Newman, J. B. (2002) Construction related factors influencing the

choice of concrete floor systems. Construction Management and Economics, 20, p. 13-
19.

Kangwa, J. and Olubodun, F. (2003a) An investigation into home owner maintenance

awareness, management and skill-knowledge enhancing attributes. Structural Survey,
21(2), p. 70-78.

Kangwa, J. and Olubodun, F. (2003b) A factor approach to analysis of home

maintenance outcomes and attributes of management successes in the owner-
occupied sector. Structural Survey, 21(4), p. 158-172.

Koebel, C. T. and Etuk, E. (1998) Improving management of assisted housing through

tenant feedback. Paper delivered at the meeting of the International Sociological
Association Research Committee 43, Housing and the Built Environment, July 26-July
31, Montreal, Canada. Available at http://www.arch.vt.edu/caus/
research/vchr/pdfreports/isa_pap.pdf [Accessed on 12 May, 2004].

Lee, R. (1995) Building maintenance management, Blackwell Science Ltd., Oxford, UK,

Lu, M. (1999) Determinants of residential satisfaction: ordered logit vs. regression

models. Growth and Change, 30(2), p. 264-287.

McGeorge, D. and Betts, M. (1990) Systems approach to building maintenance cost

forecasting. In Quah, L. K. (ed.): Building Maintenance and Modernisation Worldwide,

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 12 of 18

Singapore, 1, p. 192-199.

National Housing Federation (2001) FEEDBACK: The tenant satisfaction survey

service for social Landlords--Three Rivers District Council survey report. Available at
http://www.threerivers.gov.uk/_table/housing/tenant_survey.pdf [Accessed on 12 April,
2004].

Ngo, M. (1990) Asset management-a methodology for establishing maintenance

standards. In Ireland, V and Runeson, G. (eds.) Building Economics and Construction
Management, University of Sidney, 3, p. 149-153.

Oladapo, A. A. (2005) An evaluation of the maintenance management of the staff

housing estates of selected first generation universities in Southwestern Nigeria.
Unpublished PhD. Thesis, Dept. of Building, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife,
Nigeria.

Olubodun, F. O. (1996) An empirical approach to the evaluation of factors in local

authority housing maintenance requirements in the city of Manchester. Unpublished
PhD. Thesis, Dept. of Surveying, University of Salford, Salford, England.

Ozdemir, O. B. (2002) Reinvestment decisions and rehabilitation in housing. In Ural,

O., Abrantes, V and Tadeu, A. (eds.) Housing construction an interdisciplinary task,
Coimbra, Portugal, 3, p. 1927-1934.

Pullin, L. and Haidar, A. (2003) Managerial values in local government-Victoria,

Australia. The International Journal of Public Sector Management, 16(4), p. 286-302.

Ramamurthy, K. N. (1990) Management of maintenance and rehabilitation works. In

Ireland, V and Runeson, G. (eds.) Building Economics and Construction Management,
University of Sydney, 3, p. 158-164.

Richardson, B. A. (1991) Defects and deterioration in buildings, Spon, London.

Rosenbaum, J. E., Stroh, L. K. and Flynn, C. A. (1998) Lake Pare Place: A study of
mixed-income housing. Housing Policy Debate, 9(4), p. 703-740.

Satsangi, M. and Kearns, A. (1992) The use and interpretation of tenant satisfaction
surveys in British social housing. Environment and Planning C-Government and Policy,
10, p. 317-331.

Seeley, I. H. (1987) Building maintenance, Macmillan Press Ltd., London.

Shen, Q., Lo, K. and Wang, Q. (1998) Priority setting in maintenance management: a
modified multi-attribute approach using analytic hierarchy process. Construction
Management and Economics, 16, p. 693-702.

So, A. T. P. and Leung, A. Y T. (2004) Survey of attitudes towards buildings in three

Chinese cities: Hong Kong, Shanghai and Taipei. Facilities, 22(3/4), p. 100-108.

Sungur, C. A. and Cagdas, G. (2003) Effects of housing morphology on user

satisfaction. In Proceedings of 4th International Space Syntax Symposium, London.
Available at http://www.spacesyntax.net/
symposia/SSS4/shortpaper_abstracts/114_Sungur_Abstract_.pdf [Accessed on 11
April, 2004].

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 13 of 18

Ukoha, O. M. and Beamish, J. O. (1997) Assessment of residents' satisfaction with

public housing in Abuja, Nigeria. Habitat International, 21(4), p. 445-460.

van Wyk, K. and van Wyk, R. (2001) The management of housing processes. Paper
presented at the 2001 IHSA Conference, Pietersburg, 10 October. Available at
http://www.housing.gov.za/Content/presentations/papers/docs_papers.pdf [Accessed
on 11 April, 2004].

Varady, D. P. and Carrozza, M. A. (2000) Toward a better way to measure customer

satisfaction levels in public housing: a report from Cincinnati. Housing Studies, 15(6), p.
797-825.

Vijverberg, G. (2000) Basing maintenance needs on accommodation policy. Building

Research and Information, 28(1), p. 18-30.

Walker, D. H. T. (1994) An Investigation into Factors that Determine Building

Construction time Performance. Unpublished PhD. Thesis, Department of Building and
Construction Economics,

Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne, Australia.

Walters, M. (1999) Performance measurement systems: a case study of customer

satisfaction. Facilities, 17(3/4), p. 97-104.

Yip, N. M. (2001) Tenant participation and the management of public housing. The
Estate Management Advisory Committee of Hong Kong. Property Management, 19(1),
p. 10-18.

Adebayo A. OLADAPO

Department of Quantity Surveying, Faculty of Environmental Design

and Management, Obafemi Awalowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria

E-mail: [email protected]

Table 1. Tenants' awareness of the rationale for maintenance

Reason Frequency Percent

To keep the house safe for habitation 316 77.8

To preserve the house from decay 242 59.6
To keep the house beautiful and presentable 257 63.3
To retain the value of the house 217 53.4
Others 19 4.7
I don't know 8 2.0

Table 2. Tenants' response to the detection of defects in dwellings

Response Frequency Percent

I report faults immediately no matter how small 114 28.6

I take my time to report minor faults 3 7.5
I fix minor faults myself 177 44.5
I only report life/health-threatening faults 57 14.3
I never report faults 17 4.3

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 14 of 18

Other 3 0.08

Table 3. Kendall's coefficient of concordance test of agreement among

tenants in priority ranking

No of Cases W [chi square] df Significance

341 0.318 1628.138 15 0.000

Table 4. Comparison of priority preferences of tenants and technical

staff

Tenants

Mean Priority
Defect Variable label score rank

Defects in roof structure DEFRFSTRUCT 3.38 1

Broken louvers/panes BRKLV/PNS 9.28 12
Wall cracks WCRCKS 8.66 9
Damaged internal door DMGINDR 9.73 13
Blocked drain BLKDRN 7.68 7
Floor tile failure FLTLFLR 12.45 14
Burst pipes/sanitary BSTPP/SANAPP 5.77 3
appliances
Electrical faults ELECTFLTS 5.25 2
Damaged roofing sheets DMGRFSHTS 6.47 4
Wall tile failure WLTLFLR 12.81 16
Damaged external door DMGEXDR 6.80 5
Damaged painting/decoration DMGPTG/DECOR 12.77 15
Damaged ceiling DMGCLG 8.70 10
Damaged door locks DMGDRLKS 8.37 8
Damaged door and window DMGDR/WNFRM 9.25 11
frames
Damaged taps/stop valves DMGTPS/SVS 7.59 6

Maintenance departments

Defect Mean score Priority rank

Defects in roof structure 1.43 1

Broken louvers/panes 8.71 9
Wall cracks 8.10 7
Damaged internal door 9.38 11
Blocked drain 7.10 6
Floor tile failure 14.00 16
Burst pipes/sanitary 6.76 5
appliances
Electrical faults 4.90 2
Damaged roofing sheets 5.19 3
Wall tile failure 12.52 14
Damaged external door 5.90 4
Damaged painting/decoration 13.86 15
Damaged ceiling 9.67 13
Damaged door locks 8.57 8
Damaged door and window 9.29 10
frames
Damaged taps/stop valves 9.43 12

Table 5. Mann-Whitney test for differences between priority

preferences of tenants and technical staff (a)

Building defects

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 15 of 18

Defect 1 Defect 2 Defect 3 Defect 4

Mann-Whitney U 2540.000 3239.500 3207.000 3053.000

Wilcoxon W 2750.000 3449.500 3417.000 3263.000
Z -2.135 -0.377 -0.449 -0.790
Asymp. Sig. 0.033 0.706 0.654 0.430
(2-tailed)

Building defects

Defect 5 Defect 6 Defect 7 Defect 8

Mann-Whitney U 3255.500 2281.000 2599.000 3245.500

Wilcoxon W 3465.500 60592.000 60910.000 3455.500
Z -0.342 -2.516 -1.801 -0.365
Asymp. Sig. 0.733 0.012 0.072 0.715
(2-tailed)

Building defects

Defect 9 Defect 10 Defect 11 Defect 12

Mann-Whitney U 2606.500 3084.000 2987.500 2955.000

Wilcoxon W 2816.500 3294.000 3197.500 61266.000
Z -1.780 -0.731 -0.935 -1.023
Asymp. Sig. 0.075 0.465 0.350 0.306
(2-tailed)

Building defects

Defect 13 Defect 14 Defect 15 Defect 16

Mann-Whitney U 2949.500 3405.000 3358.000 2310.500

Wilcoxon W 61260.500 3615.000 3568.000 60621.500
Z -1.018 -0.011 -0.115 -2.431
Asymp. Sig. 0.309 0.991 0.908 0.015
(2-tailed)

(a) Grouping Variable: Tenant/Maintenance department

LEGEND

Defect 1 Defects in roof structure

Defect 2 Broken louvers/panes
Defect 3 Wall cracks
Defect 4 Damaged internal doors
Defect 5 Blocked drain
Defect 6 Floor tile failure
Defect 7 Burst pipes/broken sanitary appliances
Defect 8 Electrical faults
Defect 9 Damaged roofing sheets
Defect 10 Wall tile failure
Defect 11 Damaged external doors
Defect 12 Damaged painting/decorating
Defect 13 Damaged ceiling
Defect 14 Damaged door locks
Defect 15 Damaged door/window frames
Defect 16 Damaged taps/stop valves

Table 6. Kendall's coefficient of concordance test for tenants'

satisfaction with maintenance attributes

No. of Cases W [chi square] df Significance

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 16 of 18

330 0.208 755.894 11 0.000

Table 7. Tenants' satisfaction rating of attributes of the maintenance

system

Maintenance attribute SPSS Valid Percentage Scores

1 2 3 4

Procedures for reporting defects and 14.2 22.2 8.8 31.3

getting work done
Maintenance departments' 22.7 26.5 17.3 22.4
complaints response time
Behaviour of maintenance staff 12.1 17.8 9.6 35.9
Level of maintenance backlog 23.6 24.4 19.1 22.5
Level of nuisance (i.e. disturbance 5.2 7.6 9.5 29.9
and interference with your privacy
by maintenance staff
Speed of work (i.e. time taken by 17.2 19.8 12.4 31.9
maintenance staff to do repairs in
your house)
Quality of repairs done by 7.0 8.9 10.2 35.5
maintenance staff in your house
Cost to tenant (i.e. money/time you 23.0 22.2 14.8 27.7
spend reporting faults, transporting
maintenance staff and buying some
materials, if any
Functionality of the house (i.e. your 8.8 12.9 7.3 32.3
enjoyment of the use of the house
and services like water, electricity,
etc.)
Aesthetics of the house 6.2 11.9 7.3 39.5
The environment and surroundings 5.8 6.3 6.1 30.2
of your house

Maintenance attribute SPSS Valid Percentage Scores

5 6 7

Procedures for reporting defects and 10.9 11.1 1.6

getting work done
Maintenance departments' 6.4 4.1 0.5
complaints response time
Behaviour of maintenance staff 12.4 10.3 1.8
Level of maintenance backlog 6.1 3.4 0.8
Level of nuisance (i.e. disturbance 20.9 22.6 4.3
and interference with your privacy
by maintenance staff
Speed of work (i.e. time taken by 8.7 7.9 2.1
maintenance staff to do repairs in
your house)
Quality of repairs done by 14.4 20.6 3.4
maintenance staff in your house
Cost to tenant (i.e. money/time you 6.9 4.5 1.1
spend reporting faults, transporting
maintenance staff and buying some
materials, if any
Functionality of the house (i.e. your 16.7 17.7 4.3
enjoyment of the use of the house
and services like water, electricity,
etc.)
Aesthetics of the house 16.6 16.9 1.6
The environment and surroundings 19.5 24.1 7.9
of your house

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 17 of 18

Maintenance attribute Severity

index (%) Rank

Procedures for reporting defects and 48.93 6

getting work done
Maintenance departments' 39.61 9
complaints response time
Behaviour of maintenance staff 50.93 5
Level of maintenance backlog 39.46 10
Level of nuisance (i.e. disturbance 62.67 2
and interference with your privacy
by maintenance staff
Speed of work (i.e. time taken by 46.74 7
maintenance staff to do repairs in
your house)
Quality of repairs done by 59.54 3
maintenance staff in your house
Cost to tenant (i.e. money/time you 41.69 8
spend reporting faults, transporting
maintenance staff and buying some
materials, if any
Functionality of the house (i.e. your 57.93 4
enjoyment of the use of the house
and services like water, electricity,
etc.)
Aesthetics of the house 57.93 4
The environment and surroundings 64.99 1
of your house

Table 8. Tenants' satisfaction with the state of maintenance of their

dwellings

Rating Frequency Valid percent Cumulative percent

1. Very unsatisfied 37 9.5 9.5

2. Unsatisfied 46 11.8 21.2
3. Quite unsatisfied 46 11.8 33.0
4. Average 151 38.6 71.6
5. Quite satisfied 48 12.3 83.9
6. Satisfied 49 12.5 96.4
7. Very satisfied 14 3.6 100.0
Total 391 100.0

Table 9. Overall maintenance rating of the housing stock by tenants

Rating Frequency Valid percent Cumulative percent

1. Very bad 30 7.7 7.7

2. Bad 41 10.6 18.3
3. Quite bad 44 11.3 29.6
4. Average 150 38.7 68.3
5. Quite good 56 14.4 82.7
6. Good 52 13.4 96.1
7. Very good 15 3.9 100.0
Total 388 100.0

Table 10. Correlation between user satisfaction and state of

maintenance

Level of tenant
State of satisfaction
maintenance with the
of the maintenance

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24
A study of tenants' maintenance awareness, responsibility and satisfaction in institut... Page 18 of 18

houses of the houses

State of Pearson Correlation 1 0.532 **

maintenance
of the houses Sig. (2-tailed) - 0.000

Level of tenant Pearson Correlation 0.532 ** 1

satisfaction with
the maintenance Sig. (2-tailed) 0.000 -
of the houses

** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

(a) Listwise N = 379

COPYRIGHT 2006 Vilnius Gediminas Technical University

Copyright 2006 Gale, Cengage Learning. All rights reserved.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=161397768 2013/05/24