Technocratic Builders and Value Creation: the Struggle for Interest and Credit; a Case Study of Social Agents in the Mashhad Housing Market

This study explores the action, conditions governing the action, practical factors, and strategic approaches of the builders in the housing market. It is an exploratory, qualitative, applied, and cross-sectional research. Accordingly, a systematic analysis of the in-depth interview with 25 people in the housing market in Mashhad was conducted using the Strauss and Corbin's ground theory method. As a result, 256 sub-categories were obtained, and after several coding steps, finally, based on selective coding, the central phenomenon was called "technocratic builders in the struggle for interest and credit". The obtained paradigmatic model included a set of conditions. For example, ground conditions have been formulated as "the economic situation of the metropolitan of Mashhad" and "socio-cultural changes in the pattern of urban housing". Interventional conditions include "decline expertise of housing construction", and "the evolution of the share of land value in housing prices". Causal conditions include "the ability to manage multiple activities", "having the necessary capital or the possibility to absorb it" and "awareness of market conditions". Taking strategies such as "participatory construction", "continuous construction" and "change in construction pattern" lead to the consequences like the "periodic ups and downs at the level of builder performance", "involving with the challenge of balancing profit and loss".