Associate Professor William Cheung presents seminar at Western Sydney University

Associate Professor William K. S. Cheung, Associate Professor of Property and Deputy Head of the Department of Property at the University of Auckland Business School, presented a seminar titled The Economics of Upzoning at Western Sydney University on Friday 23 October 2026. The seminar formed part of the Western Sydney University Business School Research Seminar Series and was delivered at the University’s Parramatta City Campus, with online participation via Zoom.

Upzoning changes the economics of urban land, but the potential to build is only the start of the housing supply response: the same increase in permitted density can make redevelopment worthwhile in one neighbourhood and leave another largely unchanged. Drawing on Auckland’s 2016 Unitary Plan, the presentation examined when development rights materialise as housing and how that process relates to who lives where.

Using property transactions, parcel development records and census data, the preliminary analysis finds that company buyers place a higher value on residual development capacity than individual buyers. Additional permitted capacity, however, showed no clear positive association with redevelopment in the parcel samples examined, and redevelopment was less common where existing buildings accounted for a larger share of property value. Potential redevelopment capacity and realised redevelopment were also associated with different patterns of ethnic change that aggregate diversity measures can conceal, while early redevelopment was associated with later development nearby.

The findings raise a question for housing policy: under what conditions does the market value of development rights translate into homes, and who gains access to them? The presentation considered what uneven redevelopment means for housing affordability, and whether locally concentrated development can have lasting effects on neighbourhood housing opportunities. These questions are directly relevant to New Zealand, where the Unitary Plan and subsequent intensification policies have made the link between permitted density and realised housing supply a central issue in housing debates.

The seminar continues a growing exchange between the two property groups. In August, Associate Professor Hassan Gholipour Fereidouni of Western Sydney University presented his research on anti-money laundering regulations and house prices to the Department of Property’s seminar series in Auckland.

Associate Professor Cheung co-directs the Business School’s Urban Analytics and City Science Research Beacon. His research examines how government policies and institutions shape housing markets, with particular interest in affordability, neighbourhood change and well-being.