The market for real estate investment properties is notoriously competitive. Savvy investors win because they are able to discover great opportunities and act on them faster than their competitors.

For homebuyers, the home search process is relatively simple; Buyers will confirm a property:

1. Has a profile that fits their physical needs

2. Suits their style

3. Is in a good neighborhood

4. Is within a budget that they can afford

5. Then go inquire!

But unlike homebuyers searching for primary homes, identifying a great investment property requires an understanding of the property’s income potential. An investment property is only attractive if it can generate adequate income relative to the cost to acquire it.

To determine the adequacy of this income, the current tech stack available to the real estate investor includes far too many tools.

I took on this solo project to design a mobile app to simplify this discovery process, to allow investors to quickly analyze properties and pursue listings that meet their investment requirements, all contained in a single app on their phones. My goal was to design a real estate investment app that increases productivity and improves the property discovery experience.

Real estate investors are forced into juggling multiple tools and tool juggling is a productivity killer.

Finding the right real estate investment property can be a fragmented process. To search and then analyze a property to see if it is even worth pursuing, the investor needs to juggle a myriad of different real estate apps, spreadsheets, reports, listing sites, etc. And often times, investors are jerry-rigging tools designed for primary homebuyers to make investment decisions.

In order for an investor to find a great investment in a scarce market, increased productivity can be the differentiator between a deal won or lost.

Without adequate tools, users waste valuable time on basic due diligence and end up pursuing the wrong listings.

Current real estate apps only help users search properties based on physical profiles like location, size, and price, but neglect to offer any insights on the properties as investments. The burden is on the investor to plug numbers into spreadsheets, log in and out of multiple accounts, and do basic market due diligence on their own.

Not only does this create cognitive load for investors to manage multiple platforms, but it requires needless data entry, not to mention all the time lost from unnecessary context switches.

Some investors looking to shortcut this process may instead reach out to the sellers or listing agents prematurely, wasting time inquiring about properties that don’t meet their investment needs.

But what if there was...

An unifying tool that allows users to discover and analyze properties to determine if an investment property is worth pursuing?

Researching investors revealed their frustrations with the status quo.

In order to uncover the roadblocks real estate investors are facing, I conducted two types of formative primary research to understand how Vantage’s potential users are finding investment properties.

Surveys

User surveys are helpful in getting quantitative feedback from users across a more statistically significant sample that can be used to better guide design decisions.

I conducted a Google survey with 14 real estate investors and agents. The results helped me quantifiably measure investors’ property search process, how satisfied they are of the current online marketplace tools, and which specific metrics users rely upon to signal a good investment.

Interviews

In addition to these survey results, I interviewed a group of real estate investors to get a more in-depth understanding of the needs based on their mental modals, and how they feel about the current process.

In all, I interviewed five people with varying degrees of real estate investment experience. The goal was to understand the common challenges working with the available tools and any workarounds they use to get the job done.

Takeaway

From the survey and interview responses, there is a high level of appetite for an improved process of finding properties that meet each user's investment criteria. The common pain point is the inability for users to analyze properties quickly, to determine if a listing is worth pursuing.

Knowing that some level of analysis within the app is required, how might we integrate property analysis within the search process in order to help users determine if a listing is worth pursuing? More specifically from the interviews, how do we integrate search based on investment criteria, income information from rental listings on a mobile app? How might we integrate property analysis within the search process to help users determine if a listing is worth pursuing?

User experience drops off when they venture off platform to perform property analysis.

To visualize the pain points and frustrations that a real estate investor encounters throughout the current property discovery process, I developed a customer journey map that highlights their actions and emotions across various touch points.

The diagram was foundational to empathize with users and uncover the opportunities to improve their experiences across the entire journey.

Configuring a user flow that completes the property discovery process on Vantage, start to finish.

The path to identify a property within an investment criteria can be broken down into three phases: Search, Analyze, and Pursue. Success can only be achieved when all three stages are complete.

A design that emphasizes value and scarcity up front lets the user know when they have discovered a good investment.

To incentivize users to complete the Call To Action when they come across a good opportunity, I needed to communicate a sense of value, scarcity, and urgency on the listing.

I designed and tested three different options with the potential users:

Developing the Vantage Brand & Design System

One of the truly exciting parts of building an end-to-end mobile app is the creative freedom to design a brand that embodies the product and captivates the user. Reliable, approachable, and modern were the key brand attributes in Vantage’s style guide development.

Listening to test results can help make a good feature great.

Through moderated usability testing with actual investors and realtors, a common obstruction was the discoverability of the property analytics tool. Once the test participants found the analytics tool, they were impressed with it. It became clear that the tool discovery and page orientation needed a revamp.

Lessons learned and future state developments.

The balance of just enough information vs too much information. One of the key challenges of this project was delivering technical information that a user needs to complete the task without it being overwhelming. With this in mind, my reliance on the usability tests to ensure the copy and information hierarchy of the app match with the users’ comprehension were critical.

With an app that serves as an analytical tool, the inclusiveness of the diversity in users’ mental models and vocabulary becomes a critical step in maximizing user satisfaction across a broad spectrum.

Measuring Success

For this app to be widely adopted by real estate investors, it is important to establish some key usability metrics to help define engagement success.

A real estate app to finish the job.

Vantage is designed to empower real estate investors with a tool that increases productivity, allowing users to analyze and pursue meaningful deals more efficiently.

This project has allowed me to develop a user-centric solution to a set of validated user problems. Along the way, the challenges I came across helped me regain focus to increase the discoverability of the main features of the app, and iterated on designs to emphasize value and urgency.

I came into this concept project wanting to push myself to design an end-to-end mobile app, create a marketable brand, and build the foundations of a design system. And came away with a better understanding of the problem space, a great deal of learnings, and a viable product that I would be proud of possibly launching one day!