Building connection between property managers and homeowners
Design Team(me)
Background
Success Metrics
I hope the design would be measured through these metrics:
The home owners and property managers are satisfied with the experience.
Home owners and property mangers save time using the app to find each other.
Problem
How might we help home owners and property managers find each other and build trust, leading to seamless contract signing?
Solution
Our goal is to simplify the process of connecting homeowners and property managers. We provide a one-stop platform for easy communication, quote comparison, and trust-building, leading to smoother contract agreements.
Home owners can review property manager's qualifications, ratings and service they provided on profile page
Each property manager's profile includes their qualifications, reviews from other homeowners, and a detailed list of the services they provide.
Property managers sent quotes to show their interests in a property to the home owner within one click
Property managers can send quotes to homeowners for their desired properties using a pre-filled template that can be personalized to suit their specific needs and preferences
Building connections between home owners and property managers
Home Owners can communicate with multiple property managers at the same timeProperty managers can reach out to multiple home owners
User Journey Map
We conducted 6 interviews with both home owners and property managers, and realized some challenges they are facing right now.
Read text version of the diagram
Scenario and legend: Jane (green) is a homeowner who has moved from Seattle to California. She needs a Seattle-based property manager to rent and manage her old home. Nick (blue) is a property manager. The journey follows Search, Contact, Compare, Sign, and Service.
Search: Jane searches Google and Yelp and asks friends for recommendations; someone refers Nick. She struggles to find a rental manager because most focus on sales. Nick helps existing or potential home-sale clients rent properties and, when he is not busy, looks for homeowners on platforms with high service fees. He sees property management as a way to earn the trust of future sales clients rather than a highly rewarding job in itself.
Contact: Jane calls and emails multiple managers to ask about prices and services. She finds making numerous calls frustrating. Nick and other managers share documents, insurance information, and service types. Nick must introduce his services again with each new request and wants to limit the time spent on work that brings little income.
Compare: Jane creates a spreadsheet to compare managers and chooses Nick. She feels she must do this comparison work to find someone she can collaborate with effectively.
Sign: Jane and Nick successfully sign a contract. Jane is relieved to have finally found a property manager. Both emotional curves reach their highest point at this stage.
Service: Jane tries to contact Nick but receives fewer responses than expected. She feels managers are less responsive after signing. Nick feels his homeowner does not trust him.
Emotional trends: The chart uses five expressive faces, from very unhappy to very happy, rather than numeric scores. Jane starts unhappy, drops further during Contact, improves slightly during Compare, peaks at Sign, then drops back to her lowest level during Service. Nick starts near neutral, dips during Contact, rises during Compare and Sign, then falls slightly during Service. The central contrast is their shared optimism at signing versus Jane’s sharp disappointment afterward.
Their primary challenges include:
Ideation
I concluded the design principles based on the insights we found from user research:
Encourage effortless communication between homeowners and property managers, fostering better collaboration and information exchange.
Design an intuitive and streamlined user flow that simplifies interactions and tasks, reducing friction in the real estate management process.
Ensure that homeowners have access to all relevant information about management processes, promoting trust and informed decision-making.
Then How might we achieve these design principles?
Design
Let's take the a look at the design following the flow from the both side.
Iterate
We conducted user testings with clients, property managers, and home owners. We assigned specific tasks to these participants and asked them to complete these tasks using our prototypes, enabling us to gather valuable feedback on usability and functionality.
- "I like the ratings of property managers" --- a home owner
- "No need to make google sheets anymore" --- a home owner
- " It is easy to find listings" --- a property manager
Before
After
- Home owners seldom perform "favorite" and "share" on card lists
- "Message" is the most used function
- Home owners want to see property managers' experience
- Moved "favorite" and "share" to detail page
- Enlarged and colored the "message" for easier access
- Added the years of experience
Before
After
Our initial idea was to save all files under the "file" option in chat, but users found it hard to find a specific file because the files are not categorized.
We organized everything according to the listing, so users could access all files related to one listing in one place.
Final Design
Search & Filter
Home Owner
Property Manager
Our platform lets homeowners quickly filter and sort, so they don't need to spend extensive time searching for property managers, resorting to numerous calls and comparisons
Yirental simplifies seeking new clients solely for property management, allowing property managers to find listings in their areas quickly with user-friendly filters and sorting.
Chat & Connect
Home Owner
Property Manager
Homeowners can effortlessly access detailed information, including peer reviews, directly on property manager profiles. Plus, they can chat with multiple property managers at once, making it a breeze to find the perfect match for their needs.
When a property manager discovers a leasing opportunity they wish to manage, they can initiate direct conversations with homeowners, streamlining the communication process.
Quote & Sign
Home Owner
Property Manager
Homeowners can review all the quotes sent by property managers under a single listing, simplifying the decision-making process and ensures homeowners have a clear overview of their options.
Property managers can create pre-filled quote templates, which they can easily customize before sending them to homeowners. The no longer need to explain their services and fees multiple times repetitively
Rate & Review
Home Owner
Following the service, homeowners are invited to share their reviews and ratings of property managers, which are valuable feedback assisting future homeowners in making informed decisions.
Future Roadmap
Add Service Providers Portal
To better help home owners and property managers manage the properties, the client is considering adding service provider portal. So when designing the connection feature, I left the possibility of having the service provider possibility.
Take Aways
- Learning from Design Critiques: Despite the project's tight timeline, the constructive feedback and critiques within the design team offered me a lot of learning opportunities.
- Diverse User Testing Perspectives: Although our initial user testing primarily involved participants from large cities, given more time, I would expand the demographic to include users from various regions for more comprehensive insights.