Housea
Design a website for finding rental apartments
Project overview
Housea is a website for finding rental apartments. Housea's goal is to provide a friendly and easy-to-use rental service for foreigners living in Japan. Housea serves as a platform for searching apartments and provides users with a wealth of rental information through cooperation with housing agents. Housea supports multiple languages. The language of the user interface is assumed to be setting as Chinese for this Case Study.
For users who are unfamiliar with the unique process and rules of renting an apartment in Japan, Housea provides guides about the basics of renting an apartment and some tips. In addition, Housea supports the function of sending messages and online video meetings. So housing agents can provide online consultation services for users.
Project name
Housea
(Web)
Duration
2022.03 - 2022.04
(2 months)
Role
UX Designer
Responsibilities
User Research, wireframing, prototyping, usability studies
Understanding the user
I conducted interviews to understand the users I am designing for and their needs. Two of the main groups identified were international students and foreign national staff.
The study found that language and unfamiliarity with the rental process were problems that many people had faced when renting an apartment. Not being able to communicate fluently with real estate agents in Japanese to express their needs and not being familiar with the process of renting an apartment in Japan, such as Reikin (also known as Key Money) and guarantors, can be the reason of worry and confusion for them when renting an apartment.
In addition, some users mentioned in the interview that they could not see the apartments on-site because they were in a different location. They were worried about the actual condition of the apartments before moving in because of the little information provided.
Pain points
Language
Unable to communicate fluently with agents in Japanese to express their needs.
Procedure
Not familiar with the procedure for renting an apartment in Japan.
User persona
Based on the insights of the user interviews, I created two empathy maps. Using the empathy maps, I made two user personas. One is a student, and one is a working adult.
Empathy maps
Personas
User journey map
Goal: A easy way to decide which apartment to stay in and book an agent.
Starting the design
Before getting into the mockups and high-fidelity prototypes, I wanted to get an idea of what the core parts of the application would look like by creating sitemaps and wireframes.
Sitemap
Wireframes
Using the completed set of digital wireframes, I also created a low-fidelity prototype. So the prototype could be used in a usability study to test the core part of the product.
Usability study
I conducted two rounds of usability studies. Findings from the first study helped guide the designs from wireframes to mockups. The second study used a high-fidelity prototype and revealed what aspects of the mockups needed refining.
Round 1 Improvement
Add a button in Mobile's Bottom bar so that users can easily view the price details of the apartment at any time (Dialog).
Round 2 Improvement
Add the search feature to the Top bar to make it easy for users to start searching from any page.
When the user clicks on the "like button", the icon style changes from an outline to a fill, making the feedback clearer and easier to understand.
Refining the design
Fundations
Muckups
Prototype
I created mockups in Figma and then converted them to a high-fidelity prototype.
Going forward
What I learned
Focusing on the interview itself
In this user interview, I avoided multitasking as much as possible, such as taking many notes during the interview. Instead, I focused on the interviewees, paying attention to their tone of voice and expressions. When I encountered something I did not understand, I would try to get the interviewer to explain it clearly. By recording the interview (with the interviewee&aposs permission), I can review and organize it again afterwards. This way, I can get more information from the user interviews.
Start with the core part of the product
In this design, I first completed the part from searching for apartments to booking agents, the most core part for Housea. And use the prototype for testing and making improvements. Then add features like sending messages and blogs. Starting with the core part of the product helps me to grasp the overall structure of the service during the design process.
Structuring components to handle states, themes, and variations
I created Mockups and Prototypes using Figma. While creating components, I learned to use the auto layout and variant features. They improved the overall design uniformity and made components management easier. In addition, using the interactive component feature improved my efficiency when building prototypes.
Next steps
Taking more stakeholders into account
Include more stakeholders in the scope of the user research, such as agency staff, and develop additional types of user personas. Making Housea not only solves the problem of finding apartments for users, but also takes into account the difficulties faced by agencies.