The Team
The research is being undertaken by a collaborative, multi-disciplinary, cross-organisational team lead by CRESA.
Research team members
Kay Saville-Smith — Programme Leader
Kay Saville-Smith is a sociologist and director at CRESA, specialising in applied social research and evaluation in housing, public policy and community development. With a policy and managerial background in housing and health, she has extensive experience in quantitative and qualitative research design, evaluation, and policy analysis. Her research includes: benefit and funding policy for health, welfare, housing, disability and social services; mental health services; and housing. She was a member of research teams for: the Healthy Housing Programme (Otago University) and HEEP (BRANZ). She leads the Sustainable Neighbourhoods Stream for the BEACON Consortium. She led the evaluation of HNZC’s Rural Housing Programme, and she leads two public good science funded programmes - Ageing in Place: repairs and maintenance of older people’s housing and Building Attachment in Families and Communities Affected by Transience and Residential Mobility. Kay is a council member for the Lifetime Design Foundation Council and was a member of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on Warm Homes.
Bev James
Bev James is the principal of Public Policy & Research. She has wide-ranging experience in policy analysis and management, social research and evaluation. Dr James gained her DPhil from the University of Waikato. Prior to undertaking contracting work 16 years ago, Bev was Branch Manager, Social Policy in the Ministry of Maori Development. She has also worked for the Department of Conservation and Wellington Regional Council, and was a senior lecturer at Massey University. Recent research and publications include: (with K. Saville-Smith and R. Jaques) ‘Tools for Good Homes for Ageing in Place’ 6th Australasian Housing Researchers’ Conference ‘ Housing in an Era of Risk and Crisis’ (2012); (with K. Saville-Smith) ‘The 2050 Housing Futures for Older People in New Zealand: Three Scenarios for an Ageing Society’ European Network of Housing Researchers 22nd International Housing Research Conference, 4-7 July 2010 Istanbul Turkey (2010); “What happens to research? Responses to a project on the residential movement of children and young people” Social Policy Journal of New Zealand 33 (March 2008).
Ruth Fraser
Fraser is of Ngai Tahu descent and has trained in social policy and law. She has an LLB (Hons). She has been employed as a researcher at CRESA since October 1995. Ruth’s main interests are in the areas of the rental market, resource management, household energy use, and community development. She has extensive experience in face-to-face interviews and focus groups with a range of people and in data management and analysis of both quantitative and qualitative information. Recent research includes database design, quality control and analysis of data from surveys with local authorities and retirement villages and community housing providers undertaken for the Resilient Communities: Doing Better in Bad Times research programme. She was research officer for the evaluation of the Rural Housing Programme undertaken for Housing New Zealand Corporation, the NMT Affordable Housing Study led by MOTU, research on landlord practices for the Department of Building and Housing, and research on access to safe and secure housing for at risk and vulnerable young people.
Laurence Murphy
Laurence Murphy is Professor of Property at The University of Auckland Business School. He has published widely on property topics including; home ownership, social rental housing, mortgage securitisation, office development, the institutional evolution of listed property trusts, finance capital and entrepreneurial urban governance. In 2010 he was appointed Acting-Director of “Transforming Auckland: Institutional, Technological and Cultural Innovations for Sustainable Cities”, one of three Thematic Research Initiatives (TRI) established by The University of Auckland. Also in 2010 he was elected an Eminent Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) on the basis of his “services to the property industry in New Zealand”, “leadership of the Department of Property at The University of Auckland Business School” and “distinguished international research record”. He was the principal Investigator of a Royal Society Marsden Fund project entitled “(Extra)Ordinary Auckland: Exploring local meanings and understandings of globalisation” and has been involved in several major research projects funded by the Centre for Housing Research Aotearoa/New Zealand (CHRANZ). Dr Murphy completed his PhD in Urban Economic Geography at the University of Dublin (Trinity College). He has held lecturing posts at Trinity College Dublin, Queen’s University Belfast and the London School of Economics. Professor Murphy is project manager for Auckland University’s component of the Finding the Best Fit research project led by CRESA.
Dr Michael Rehm
Michael is a Senior Lecturer in Property at the University of Auckland Business School. Michael’s research focus has been on the development of hedonic pricing models used to isolate and better understand specific behaviour of market participants within residential and office markets. His research incorporates geographic information systems (GIS) to model and explore the often underappreciated spatial relationships prevalent in property markets including work on school zoning, proximity to cell phone towers and leaky building stigma. Michael’s research on leaky buildings was featured in In the Leaky Building Crisis: Understanding the Issues, a book on New Zealand’s leaky building crisis. His latest research is on housing affordability and the impacts of inclusionary zoning on residential land development. Michael is a member of the American Real Estate Society and the Pacific Rim Real Estate Society. In 2011 he was appointed to the Editorial board of the Pacific Rim Property Research Journal.
Fiona Cram
Fiona is of Ngati Pahauwera descent and has a PhD in social and developmental psychology from the University of Otago. She has lectured in Social Psychology and has also been a senior research fellow at the International Research Institute for Maori and Indigenous Education, at the University of Auckland. In 2003 Fiona established Katoa Ltd – a Maori indigenous research organisation that undertakes Kaupapa Maori (by Maori, for Maori) research and evaluation, as well as offering a range of research and evaluation training. Fiona’s research interests are wide-ranging including Maori health, justice and education. Fiona is undertaking the Maori case study for this programme.