Sustainability of Residential Buildings in Nigeria: An Appraisal of the Factors that Influence Maintenance of Residential Buildings’ Standards

Abstract

Sustainability issues in residential buildings in many cities of the world and the search for factors that influence the level of maintenance of residential buildings, with  appropriate measures to assist in the solutions to the problems of building maintenance has been an issue of concern, most especially to the house designers and developers in Niger State, Nigeria. This paper therefore planned to determine factors that influence the level of maintenance of residential buildings’ standards. The research method employed was descriptive and inferential survey. The data collected were subjected to uni-variate analysis and multi-variate analysis, using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). The study found among others that factors that influence the level of maintenance of residential buildings standards includes, (i) building’s state of repair, (ii) building type and (iii) Owners/Occupiers highest level of education. The paper concludes that for any meaningful approach to maintainability of residential buildings in view of adequate provision of descent accommodation for the populace, Government and other stakeholders needs to embark on public enlightenment campaign for the residential buildings’ owners/occupants on the need for residential buildings and building premises maintenance and the implication for failure to maintain buildings and buildings’ premises regularly.

Keywords: Appraisal, building standards, maintenance, residential building, sustainability.