Redesigning Place4Students.com:
A seamless housing search experience.
Project Type
UI/UX Design
Duration
September - October 2024
Tool Used
Figma
Overview
The Place4Students.com redesign project aims to help college students find safe and affordable housing near their campus.
The focus is on improving:
・usability
・transparency
・security
to provide a smooth property search and rental process.
Problem
Students face challenges in finding safe, affordable housing due to financial stress, high competition, and trust issues with landlords and rental platforms.
Solution
Enhanced transparency with property reviews and safety indicators, simplified budgeting tools, and a student-friendly booking process make housing searches easier and more reliable.
My Role
I was responsible for UX research, user testing, wireframing, UI design, and prototyping to create a smooth and user-friendly experience.
Research
During the research phase, we also conducted a heuristic evaluation of the current website. We assessed key usability principles such as visibility of system status, user control and freedom, and consistency to identify areas for improvement.
This evaluation revealed several usability issues, including unclear system feedback, limited navigation flexibility, and inconsistent design elements.
Personas
To better understand the needs of our target audience, we identified the following personas:
・Students aged 25-45 seeking convenient and affordable housing near campus.
・Functionality-driven users who prioritize ease of use, quick property comparisons, and
a secure rental process.
・Design-driven users who value a user-friendly interface and seamless, intuitive design for a smooth rental experience.
Define
We visualized the process of booking a room through a detailed user flow diagram and created a user journey map. This allowed us to better understand the user's path and identify pain points that needed addressing.
The user flow served as the basis for the design of the following interfaces:
Property Search: Users can filter and compare properties by price, location, and amenities.
Room Booking: A step-by-step process with clear feedback from selection to confirmation.
Confirmation: A clear confirmation page to finalize the booking.
Ideation
We brainstormed ideas based on our research, from which several key insights and ideas emerged:
・Increase transparency in listings
・Personalized recommendations
・Search by list or map view
Our initial sketches helped us delve deeper into these concepts and refine the scope of our idea.
We narrowed the scope and features to focus on:
・Improve safety with clear property details, reviews, and landlord information.
・Suggest properties based on user preferences such as budget and location.
・Allow users to switch between list and map views for easy browsing.
Low-Fidelity Prototypes
Using Figma, we built an interactive low-fidelity prototype centered around the property search and booking process. We aimed to optimize the user experience by checking the usability of the navigation and interface.
We focused on the following steps:
・Users can easily browse rentals both listings and maps
・Filter and compare properties
・Smooth booking and contact process
User Testing
We used a low-fidelity mockup of the app with a few participants to evaluate the prototype.
Participants were given the following tasks:
・Browse Search Results from Map Search
・Contact the Landlord
・Browse the Help Centre Page for general rental information
We asked participants to navigate through all the screens in the process and verbalize their thoughts as they moved through the interface.
Key Takeaways from User Testing
The user testing revealed key insights and actionable improvements across onboarding, navigation, search functionality, product details, favorites, cart, and overall design.
Key Feedback:
・Map switching button is hard to find
・Support center is hard to find in the footer
・Confusion between “ Room Viewing” and “Book a room”
Improvements:
・Make the button more visible with better placement and design.
・Support link adds a fixed "Support" button on the homepage.
・Rename to “Arrange a Visit” and “Book a Room” for clarity.
High-Fidelity Prototypes
The final high-fidelity prototype was created based on user testing and feedback, with the following main improvements:
・Property details: Added a map for location comparison and included distance to school.
・Contact page: Simplified actions for clarity and ease.
・Search and navigation: Improved map toggle visibility and included a property filter for customized searches.
Feedback helped us address key usability issues and refined the search experience, information, and customization to meet our users’ needs.
Current design
Redesigned
Current design
Redesigned
Final Prototype
What I Learned...
Through this website redesign project, I learned that researching the existing design is crucial for identifying usability issues, but explaining why a design is difficult to use can sometimes be challenging. It required detailed analysis to pinpoint subtle problems, such as unclear navigation and inefficient layouts, and translate those insights into actionable design improvements.
Additionally, by understanding the struggles of students searching for affordable housing, I realized that small changes—like improving the visibility of key elements or adding filters to enhance search customization—can have a significant impact on the user experience.
This iterative process, driven by user feedback, allowed me to refine the design in a way that truly addressed users' needs.
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