Overview
Homes guides homebuyers in finding property listings and becoming informed decision makers while navigating the complexities of qualifying for a mortgage.
Role
I designed the onboarding experience, key features, pattern library and color palette for the mobile app re-design of the third-largest real estate portal in the United States.
Impact
App version 9.6.0 launched in 2017 featuring improved usability and an average rating of 4.6 out of 5 on the app store.
My contribution
Role:
UI Designer
The team
1 × product manager
1 × UI designer
3 × engineers
Year
2015
Process
Discovery
Color decisions where based on the two key emotions identified during Discovery - Dependability and Fun.
The primary brand color is orange, representing the optimistic character of the brand, but the core palette felt dated and I implemented an extended palette of oranges, blues and neutrals along with red and green for alerts.
Prototype and Test
To provide users with a more dependable experience, we focused on areas where they where experiencing negative emotions and documenting areas where navigation seemed incoherent.
View InVision prototype.
Collaborate
Enjoying full ownership of the product, I worked closely with the product manager to completely redesign key app features such as the brand’s mortgage calculator.
I also collaborated with designers and developers to create a design system with code components housed in Confluence to align with Jira, which was being used by the engineering team.
Outcome
Improved usability
App version 9.6.0 launched in 2017.
The outcome was a released version of the app that boasted useful home purchasing tools in addition to a:
robust search experience;
improved user onboarding;
improved UI.