Apartment Finder Usability Case Study

*This project was completed through the Google UX certificate program.

Role

UX/UI Designer

Duration

~50 hours

Tools

Adobe XD, Miro

User research

Surveys were distributed to participants that have gone through the apartment finding process before and are familiar with apartment finder apps and websites as this would be the target audience for this new experience. Survey questions were tailored to pinpoint specific pain points and opportunities for features users would want or consider helpful.

Survey questions:

Do you use apartment finding websites as a way to browse around or do you use them solely to find your next place to live?
When using an apartment finding website, what aspect is the most important to you?
What challenges or frustrations do you have when using apartment finding websites?
How would you order these features of apartments in order of most to least important: Price, amenities, close to work/school, nearby restaurants and entertainment, apartment size, lease length, area safety, and if utilities are included.
Are there any features missing in the list above that you consider an important feature to call out when searching for apartments?

Pain points:

1

Having to create an account or share personal information

Users are frustrated when their results or searches are locked behind something

2

Lack of area safety information and crime rate

Users consider this important when searching for a new place to live

3

Not being able to see which apartments are move-in ready

Users want to see exactly which apartments are available when

Problem statement

Jenny is a college student who needs to find an affordable, safe apartment because she wants to live alone close to campus.

Mockups & high-fidelity prototype

View the prototype ⟶

Usability testing

Methodology

Participants were all people who have gone through the apartment finding process before. One male and four females, between the ages of 21 and 56.

Unmoderated virtual usability study on the high-fi prototype, participants given introduction and instructions to view the prototype while completing prompts.

Research questions

Prompts were based on completing certain tasks around the site such as how they would go about beginning their search for an apartment, viewing specific features of an apartment, what they would do once interested, and asking follow-up questions about whether or not they were satisfied with the information presented and what was missing.

Findings and themes

1

Users were unable to find the area safety information

"Stumbling across "At a glance" I finally found the area safety rating. I think seeing all the numbers and dollar signs in the big blue boxes I just assumed it was something relevant to money and purchasing."

2

Users expect to see information regarding parking

"I don't see any parking information though. What type of parking is there? Garages?"

3

Users prefer to contact an apartment complex directly

"I wouldn't use the send message button, I don't really like sending messages and waiting for a response back. I would maybe call but like I said, I would just go down there or apply online."

Affinity diagram

View larger in Miro ⟶

Conclusion

While users find using the website in terms of search and like the way information is presented, they were unable to find the area safety information, a feature that was highlighted to be very important in the user research.

Next steps

The website would need to add features and information users requested in the usability test, such as parking information and making the area safety rating more prominent.

Quotes

"It was very easy to navigate around the site, the design made it easy to find information. I like that I could see best deals, popular picks, and keep a list of apartments I am interested in."

"I would like to know about the parking situation, maybe if there is covered parking, how many vehicles I can park, if there is additional parking available for a price, if there is a good amount of guest parking."