Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim

Improvements and integration of a public transport system: the case of Singapore

Abstract This paper illustrates the initiatives undertaken in Singapore to improve and enhance the public transport system. Being a small city-state, with limited land supply, encouraging the use of public transport and restraining car ownership and usage seems to be an obvious choice in managing the city-state’s transport problems. Policy covers not only improvements of the public modes but also enhancement of all intermediate and end-point facilities, such as linkways, customer service and service information. In addition, policy makers are also moving towards various aspects of integration in the pursuit of achieving seamless travel via the public transport system.

Quality of Life of Residents Living near Industrial Estates in Singapore

Quality of life (QOL) studies are increasinglygaining the attention of urban planners due toits usefulness in assessing and monitoringpublic policies. With this in mind, an attemptwas made in this study to assess the quality oflife of residents staying near industrialestates in Jurong, Singapore using 18subjective life indicators to measure theoverall life satisfaction.Based on a 5-point Likert scale, health (4.48),family life (4.37) and public safety (4.13)emerged as the more important aspects, whileself-development (3.90), religion (3.60) andpolitics (2.74) were named by the respondentsto be among the least important. On thesatisfaction level, public safety (3.92),family life (3.88), and public utilities (3.78)were deemed to be among the most satisfiedaspects, while consumer goods (2.92), politics(2.91) and environment (2.89) were consideredto be among the least satisfied aspects. Therelationship between the different demographicvariables with overall life satisfaction werealso determined and five variables, namely,marital status, education level, occupation,household income and household size were foundto contribute significantly to the overall lifesatisfaction scores.Overall, the residents in Jurong were found tobe generally satisfied with their life, scoringa mean satisfaction rating of 3.687. It ishoped that the data gathered from this studycan be used by planners in formulating andimplementing future policies.

Disaggregating the travel components in shopping centre choice

Transport mode attributes have often been neglected in the retailing and transportation literature in retail outlets choice studies. Most of the retailing and transportation literature has only adopted the traditional measures of deterrence, namely, travel time, distance and/or travel cost. Similar phenomena exist in real estate research, particularly in real estate market analysis and valuation. However, a few studies have shown that other attributes of the travel component, such as comfort, reliability of transport mode, etc., are significant in affecting shopping centres’ patronage. With the heightening of issues such as sustainable development and environmental pollution, many governments are gearing to provide greater choices and better quality public transport modes to shopping centres. Therefore, with more transport options, shoppers are likely to consider the characteristics of each transport option in greater detail in their choice of shopping centres. Therefore, in view of this widespread phenomenon, it is timely to provide greater understanding of the travel components in shopping trips. In the light of the above development, this paper aims to disaggregate the travel components in shopping centre choice. By way of principal component analysis, it presents the salient dimensions of transport attributes and shopping centre characteristics in shopping centre choice. Using the weighted factor rating, it found that, in addition to the shopping centre attributes, as well as the conventional measures of travel components, shoppers consider other travel factors in their choice of shopping centres. This in turn has implications on valuation practices.

Macroeconomic risk influences on the property stock market

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide an analysis of the relationship between expected risk premia on property stocks and some major macroeconomic risk factors as reflected in the general business and financial conditionsDesign/methodology/approach – Employs a three‐step estimation strategy (principal component analysis, GARCH (1,1) and GMM) to model the macroeconomic risk variables (GDP growth, INDP growth, unexpected inflation, money supply, interest rate and exchange rate) and relate them to the first and second moments on property stock excess returns of four major markets, namely, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan and the UK. Macroeconomic risk is measured by the conditional volatility of macroeconomic variables.Findings – The expected risk premia and the conditional volatilities of the risk premia on property stocks are time‐varying and dynamically linked to the conditional volatilities of the macroeconomic risk factors. However there are some disparities in the significance, as well as direct...

Attitudes to transport modes for shopping purposes in Singapore

A review of the retailing and transportation literature shows that there is an apparently large research gap in the understanding of shoppers’ attitudes towards transport modes for shopping purposes. In particular, not many studies have been done to examine shoppers’ detailed and disaggregated attitudinal image structures of the various transport modes for shopping purposes. Using Singapore as a study area, this paper has attempted to investigate shoppers’ image structure of transport modes and their comparative perception ratings for the various modes of transportation for shopping purposes. Using principal component analysis, the research has unveiled the perceptions of five transport modes for shopping purposes. While some of the factors are unique to certain transport modes, other factors, namely ‘suitability’, ‘practicality’, ‘ease of travel’ and ‘cost’, are common to all modes of transportation. By way of the weighted‐factor rating, the study found that the car recorded the highest overall perception rating while the bus rated the lowest. In addition, the shoppers have reasonably good perception of public transport modes in Singapore.

Shariah compliant real estate development financing and investment in the Gulf Cooperation Council

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to investigate Shariah compliant real estate development financing and investment in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Design/methodology/approach - In this paper, the authors employed desk research and survey to examine issues relating to Shariah compliant real estate development financing and investment. Following the desk research, 18 in-depth interviews were conducted with senior executives of banks, real estate developers and consultants. Findings - Equity Shariah instruments are found to be in high demand by real estate investors, however they are rarely offered by Islamic banks. In addition, the survey results confirm that Islamic financiers tend to partner real estate companies through land acquisition to post construction, contrary to how conventional financiers operate, therefore reducing moral hazard issues. Research limitations/implications - As Shariah compliant real estate research and knowledge is limited, the authors faced a challenge in getting respondents who are familiar and willing to participate in the interview. Nevertheless, the 18 respondents gave adequate inputs to enable the authors to write the research paper. Practical implications - The paper includes challenges and implications for the future developments of Shariah compliant real estate development financing and investment. Originality/value - This paper provides the Shariah compliant perspective of real estate development financing and investment, where the current knowledge is very limited.

Automated valuation model: an application to the public housing resale market in Singapore

Purpose – This paper aims to construct an appropriate automated valuation model to value Housing and Development Board resale flats in Singapore. The paper also aims to test the accuracy of the model by comparing the values generated with actual valuations performed by a property firm in Singapore. In addition, it seeks to examine whether models for the sub‐markets of Housing and Development Board resale flats based on location or type of flat are more “sufficiently accurate” than the general model.Design/methodology/approach – Using transacted data of 1,483 HDB resale flats, a hedonic price model is used to estimate housing price. The variables adopted include floor area of the housing unit, floor level of the housing unit, age, distance from central business district and distance from the mass rapid transit station.Findings – The study found that the general model provides sufficient accuracy when producing valuations. The models based on sub‐markets, namely, “location” and “type of flats” produced reas...

The idiosyncratic risks of a Shariah compliant REIT investor

This paper investigates the impact of Shariah compliant investment principles on the idiosyncratic risks of a Shariah compliant REIT investor. The importance of idiosyncratic risks in explaining cross-sectional returns of a constructed Shariah compliant REIT investor’s portfolio is further examined in this paper. In all constructed portfolios examined, there is a positive and significant relationship between expected idiosyncratic volatility and expected REIT returns of the constructed Shariah compliant portfolio (GCC Shariah compliance standards). This result is consistent and persistent after robustness tests are carried out. As such, idiosyncratic risks are an important factor to consider in the pricing of Shariah compliant REIT stock returns. On further examination, the significant relationship as seen in the constructed Shariah compliant portfolio can be explained from the firm-specific risks of the residential REIT sector which is the most dominant sector during the period of investigation. The implications of these results also point to the importance of Shariah compliance standards and screening methods which is a significant feature associated with the understanding of the relationship of idiosyncratic risks on expected REIT returns of Shariah portfolios. Results show contrasting results between a less-restrictive and restrictive Shariah compliant portfolio. We find a significant relationship between expected returns and the idiosyncratic risks specifically in the restrictive Shariah compliant portfolio.

Personifying Public Housing Estates: Evidence from Singapore

AbstractAdopting the concept of brand personality, this paper aims to determine the personalities of three public housing estates in Singapore, specifically Jurong East, Pasir Ris and Sengkang housing estates. These three housing estates have distinctive personalities, but also share certain traits. This research provides an avenue for town planners, town councillors, as well as estate managers to measure and position the brand personalities of their housing estates, as well as meeting the needs of the residents living in the housing estates.Abstract Adopting the concept of brand personality, this paper aims to determine the personalities of three public housing estates in Singapore, specifically Jurong East, Pasir Ris and Sengkang housing estates. These three housing estates have distinctive personalities, but also share certain traits. This research provides an avenue for town planners, town councillors, as well as estate managers to measure and position the brand personalities of their housing estates, as well as meeting the needs of the residents living in the housing estates.

Positioning of Shopping Centres Within the Retail Market of Singapore

Abstract There has been substantial research on factors affecting the performance of shopping malls and how retail images affect shoppers’ perceptions of shopping centres. However, little research has been done to investigate how these attributes will affect the dimensions of brand positioning of shopping centres. By using a Multidimensional Scaling Model to create perceptual maps, pictorial positions of ten shopping centres are presented spatially in a map, according to shoppers’ perceptions. The results indicate that a two-dimensional perceptual map is appropriate for this study. Factor analysis is adopted to find the two significant major factors that best described the two dimensions, namely “shopping centre attributes” and “product attributes”. After determining the dimensions, a two-dimensional map is created using the Multidimensional Scaling Model. The perceptual map shows the relative positioning of the ten shopping centres and four competitive sets of clusters are identified. Shopping centre managers could use these maps to apply different marketing strategies and plans according to the different segments in order to gain competitive advantage and to identify new opportunities and competition.