Attached
“House” is a powerful symbol of socio-economic
background of individuals and families. In fact, housing provides all
types of needs/wants from basic needs to self-actualization needs.
This phenomenon can be realized only having analyzed hidden
motives of buyers and sellers of the housing market. Hence, the aim
of this study is to examine the socio-economic insight of the
secondary housing market in Colombo suburbs. This broader aim was
achieved via analyzing the general pattern of the secondary housing
market, identifying socio-economic motives of sellers of the
secondary housing market, and reviewing sellers’ experience of
buyer behavior. A purposive sample of 50 sellers from popular
residential areas in Colombo such as Maharagama, Kottawa,
Piliyandala, Punnipitiya, and Nugegoda was used to collect primary
data instead of relevant secondary data from published and
unpublished reports. The sample was limited to selling price ranging
from Rs15 million to Rs25 million, which apparently falls into
middle and upper-middle income houses in the context. Participatory
observation and semi-structured interviews were adopted as key data
collection tools. Data were descriptively analyzed. This study found
that the market is mainly handled by informal agents who are
unqualified and unorganized. People such as taxi/tree-wheel drivers,
boutique venders, security personals etc. are engaged in housing
brokerage as a part time career. Few fulltime and formally organized
agents were found but they were also not professionally qualified. As
far as housing quality is concerned, it was observed that 90% of
houses was poorly maintained and illegally modified. They are
situated in poorly maintained neighborhoods as well. Among the
observed houses, 2% was moderately maintained and 8% was well
maintained and modified. Major socio-economic motives of sellers
were “migrating foreign countries for education and employment”
(80% and 10% respectively), “family problems” (4%), and “social
status” (3%). Other motives were “health” and
“environmental/neighborhood problems” (3%). This study further
noted that the secondary middle income housing market in the area
directly related with the migrants who motivated for education in
foreign countries, mainly Australia, UK and USA. As per the
literature, families motivated for education tend to migrate Colombo
suburbs from remote areas of the country. They are seeking
temporary accommodation in lower middle income housing.
However, the secondary middle income housing market relates with
the migration from Colombo to major global cities. Therefore, final
transaction price of this market may depend on migration related
dates such as university deadlines, visa and other agreements. Hence,
it creates a buyers’ market lowering the selling price. Also it was
revealed that the buyers tend to trust more on this market as far as the
quality of construction of houses is concerned than brand new houses which are built for selling purpose.
