A quantified model for assessment of drivers of acquiring green buildings by potential clients

In the context of an ongoing crisis related to climate change resulting from human activities as well as global attempts to reverse or mitigate this process, the role of sustainable buildings is of utmost importance. Although this study is a part of the continuous effort to investigate the attitudes of potential clients toward green buildings (GB) from the drivers’ point of view. The proposed study developed a quantified model for assessing the drivers in the context of a developing country, thus filling the gap in the field. The methodology adopted in this study is of a mixed nature and is based on (a) an extensive literature review aimed to identify some of the most influential drivers in the international context, and (b) an analysis of primary data collected via a survey among the general population (potential clients) to understand their perceptions regarding the identified drivers (factors). Various factors that may trigger potential homebuyer’s purchase intention were combined and presented in a form of a conceptual model. The structural equation modeling technique, which combines factor analysis and multiple regression, was applied to carry out the analysis of the obtained data. This is the primary technique to examine and quantify the relative influence of latent variables on the measured phenomena. The results of the study indicate that the ‘client’s environmental concern’ has the highest impact on the attitude toward purchasing GB (β = 0.7812). In turn, ‘marketing and promotion’ efforts (especially promotional events and a word of mouth) were found to be the highest and second impact to intention to purchase (β = 0.7402) and attitude toward purchasing (β = 0.6617) ‘Client’s awareness and knowledge’ (β = 0.7279) and ‘governmental incentives’ (including tax incentives, grants, and soft loan incentives) were identified as the next most influential drivers. Despite the limitations that could be linked to the demographics, the findings of the paper identified and ranked the potential drivers which are mostly related to awareness, marketing, and incentives from the government. It is recommended to follow the presented methodology to identify the drivers of acquiring GBs in any context. However, the identified and ranked list of drivers could be referred as an indicative list which should be taken into consideration while developing policies and strategies.