To study the property management performance in public rental housing (PRH) between the Housing Authority (HA) and Private Service Agents (PSAs)

Abstract

It is not uncommon for the public sector to provide the goods or services through privatization due to its advantages. The private sector is regards as more efficient, effective and economic than those of the government. In Hong Kong, the Housing Authority (HA) is a large single party to own public rental housing (PRH) units. According to the annual report of HA 2017-2018, as at 31.3.2018, there are 181 PRH estates with 776,547 PRH units. Due to the enormous PRH stocks, the industry of property management plays an important role in Hong Kong. In order to save the cost and improve the service quality, the provision of property management service in parts of PRH estates has been privatizing to the private service agents (PSAs) since 1996. According to HA (2019), until now, about 60% of the property management service in PRH has been contracted out to PSAs and the remaining 40% are managed HA. However the property performance in PSA-managed estates has been criticized recently and there is a voice in society that HA should take back the management service in PRH estates. Moreover, there is not too much literature to compare the property management performance between HA-managed estates and PSA-managed estates. As a result, in this paper, it aims to study the property management performance in PRH between HA and PSAs. The pros and cons of theses different property management modes are also examined. For this study, data was collected by the qualitative and quantitative methods. For the qualitative method, the survey of resident’s satisfaction on the performance of the property management was carried out. The survey is included different aspects such as cleaning, security, repair and maintenance, marking scheme of the property management in PRH. For the quantitative method, in-depth interviews were carried out to explore the current property management mode in PRH. Based on the findings of this paper, it indicates that there are advantages and disadvantages in both of HA-managed and PSA-managed estates. It also finds out strengths and weaknesses of different management modes. Besides, the current property management situation in PRH is also studied. Recommendations are made to the government for improvement of the existing property management mode in PRH.