Property Management
TITAN Associates Property Management
My Roles
- UX Research
- UX Strategy
Project Background
Titan Associates is a real estate property investment and management company with multiple single-family residences leased throughout the Dallas-Ft. Worth metroplex. Their assets are mid-sized homes in middle class neighborhoods, strategically purchased to be near amenities such as schools, parks and shopping in order to attract small or new families. While there is no restriction on applicants, the organization would like to understand the niche market better, and ensure they are catering to their target market. That target especially emphasizes single mothers who need safe and affordable housing with special considerations to assist with young children.
Task And Mission
- Distinguish and document key trends in the industry that impact renter satisfaction
- Pinpoint and document issues and amenities that impact renter reaction to price in the market
- Identify the demographics represented within the target market
- Personify the research findings into a digestible format that describes the user’s pain points
- Make recommendations concerning the digitalization of the user experience and use of technology
DISCOVERY
Research Goals
- Ascertain motivation to rent a house rather than an apartment
- Clarify expectations in price, and the impact square footage or amenities has willingness to increase budget
- Discover potential renter’s “have to have”, and “like to have” concerning a rental home, and rank order
- Identify what functionality renters would like to have on a site in looking for a potential rental
- Identify what functionality renters would like to have on a site in maintaining their account once they have a lease
DEFINE
Personas
At the conclusion of research, findings were used to inform persona creation. There were 3 personas identified. (Include link to the personas)
DESIGN
Card Sort
A Card Sorting exercise was used to establish the best structure for the Information Architecture. Based on the resulting feedback from interviewees, the top 10 desired functionalities were identified for each of the 2 visitor types,
1. Prospective tenants
2. Existing tenants (in-depth personas were later created for the existing tenants)
A card was created corresponding to each of the 10 desired functionalities pertaining to each of the 2 visitor types. It was quickly evident that for the prospects, each of the 10 functionalities was a step in what could be one user journey. Participants were asked to place those 10 cards in their logical order. For the functionality desired by existing tenants, participants were asked to group tasks in order to define the most intuitive IA.
Recommendations for Implementation
Recommendations are divided into 2 categories in keeping with the 2 specific asks concerning recommendations moving forward. All of the functionality can be supported with one site, based on response to a simple question upfront to a user. The top 10 requested functionalities are listed as recommended as base functionality on the proposed site.
Is the user (A) looking for a home to lease, or (B) are they an existing tenant looking to do something on their account?
(A)
- Select from a group of filters what characteristics they would like a home to have
- Selected criteria is identified as critical or optional
- User entered zip code to identify the desired area
- Search based on the above criteria
- Results returned in rank order based on how a property scored against the given user identified criteria
- Pictures of the home (inside and out) are available on the carousel for viewing
- Complete application process
- Pay application fee (Debit card or credit card)
- Review application status
- Pay deposit (Debit card or credit card) based on application approval
(B)
- Secure log in
- Review the lease ledger (debits and credits)
- Make a payments (Debit card or credit card)
- Set up auto pay
- Save a recurring method of payment
- Change a recurring method of payment
- Update contact information (phone or email)
- Report a problem
- Request renewal
- Review deposit return status
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