Improving empathic evaluations in virtual reality for marketing of housing projects

Virtual reality technology has been proven in various research as an effective visualisation tool. This research examines the potentials of virtual reality as a pre-purchase evaluation tool for potential homebuyers to facilitate home purchase decisions. An experiment was conducted to determine whether virtual reality could replace the real environment evaluation of housing design based on emotion and behavioural responses. Results of the experiment suggest that there are no significant differences in the emotions evoked in real and virtual environment. The structural model assessments using PLS-SEM also revealed that atmospherics significantly and positively affect pleasure and arousal emotions. Pleasure was also found to positively influence home purchase intention. This paper highlights practical implications of virtual reality to be strategically applied as a tool for design evaluation especially in the housing industry for better housing design that is more empathic, user- centred and satisfies the emotional and social needs of potential homebuyer.