Brick.ly Design exercise
Our agency ran a mock design exercise to simulate the discovery process for a potential client. We collectively decided on identifying service opportunities for a fictional real-estate company, Brick.ly. The goal was to demonstrate the breadth of our abilities during an idealized discovery process.
Team: 6 Designers
CHALLENGE
How might we make access to real estate possible for more people?
approach
Conduct qualitative research to understand the home purchase experience for buyers, sellers and agents to identify potential new business opportunities for Brick.ly.
Our PROCESS
Prospective Buyers
Prospective buyers have aspirations to buy a home in the foreseeable future (1-5 years). Some may have started a casual search.
They have little knowledge of the process, as they have not bought property before.
Buyers
Buyers are actively engaged in the purchase process or have recently bought a property.
They have a moderate level of knowledge of the purchase process and may have bought/sold property before.
Sellers
Sellers are actively engaged in the selling process or have recently sold a property (past year).
They have a moderate level of knowledge of the selling processes, which is largely informed by their experience purchasing.
Agents
Buyer and seller agents facilitate the buying or selling experience. They are a conduit for all communication between parties.
Agents have a high level of knowledge of the buying/selling process, but do not want to be put in a position to advise financially or legally.
Attending open houses
Interviews
Journey mapping
Team insight share back
WHAT WE FOUND
Complex motivations
The decision to purchase real estate is often the result of social expectations and pressures.
Assistance programs
Buyers working with support and training programs (non profits, etc) had better outcomes.
Lack of real estate savvy
There's an overall lack of knowledge around the process that lies ahead.
Lack of finance savvy
There's an overall lack of knowledge and confusion around how to prepare financially.
Browsing is enjoyable
A majority of prospective buyers report enjoyment from browsing listing sites and imagining a new life.
Lifestyle changes
Most buyers struggle make lifestyle changes in order to save.
Prospective buyers
Life changes and social norms influence the decision to own
- We heard people mention owning as a way to step up get a leg up in life.
- Most people reported feeling like they were throwing away their money renting.
- We heard a lot about people wanting to get more space to accommodate for life changes like marriage, children and pets.
Saving for a downpayment requires tough compromises
- Many reported difficulties adjusting spending habits and cutting back on lifestyle perks life travel and eating out.
- Many sacrifice current living situation, either moving in with parents or getting a roommate.
- The realities of saving for a downpayment are perceived as lengthy and difficult. Many people explore additional ways to generate income (ie second job, freelancing, gig economy).
- Our secondary research showed that most financial advise content suggests paying down debts before even beginning to save for a downpayment.
How might we empower prospective buyers to prepare financially for home ownership, and help set expectations about the purchase process?
CURRENT BUYERS
A competitive market
Buyers are facing a very competitive market and feel a sense of futility.
Team management is critical
Vendors currently lack tools and channels to collaborate and communicate.
Listing sites lack trust
Popular, online search tools generally aren’t trusted for communication or actuate financial estimates.
Inspections hinder process
The process doesn't find fundamental issues and produces confusing documentation.
Pre-approvals are misleading
These documents overpromise and lack weight regarding mortgage applications.
Documents stall process
Documents are analog, and lack standardization, which makes them hard to digest and share.
Surprise fees
Expensive fees add up with little transparency and expectation setting.
No clear timeline
This process has many important milestones, but few notifications around them.
The inspection is perceived as having little value and promotes distrust.
- Buyer beware: inspections are seen by buyers as a risk mitigation tactic. These efforts are usually paid for by buyers and can provide them with topics for negotiation.
- We heard multiple times that inspections are generally surface level; and don’t uncover deeper problems like electrical issues or asbestos.
- Many participants described the resulting reports as not clear, scannable or actionable. Some confessed that they hadn’t read the report due to the cognitive and emotional efforts involved.
- Inspections (and the resulting negotiations) are perceived to slow the purchase process so much, that in the Bay Area, sellers commonly disclose inspection information with their listing, in an effort to streamline the process.
The complex nature and lack of document accessibility slows the purchase process.
- Documents are not designed for non-experts. We heard from many participants of frustrations with the complex nature of documents and their difficulties understanding them.
- A lack of standardization between document types also contributed to buyer frustrations, and forced them to learn and re-learn how to read them.
- A lack of digital accessibility of documents within the team was also voiced as a frustration for buyers, as it was perceived as preventing transparency and efficiency of process.
How might we facilitate a more streamlined, transparent and collaborative purchase experience for buyers?
Preparing to sell is lengthy and emotional
This process, of cleaning, making repairs and getting rid of old things, can be emotional and take years for some sellers.
Optimizing profits
Sellers weigh multiple factors to ensure the best sale price.
Home as a commodity
Sellers can find it difficult to set aside emotions from the sales experience and think of their property as a commodity.
Lifestyle disruption
The preparation and maintenance required to keep a home show-room ready coupled with a steady stream of strangers is major disruption to daily routines.
SELLERS
Sellers find it hard to think of their home as a commodity.
- Sentimentality and personal taste/lifestyle preferences can cloud realistic expectations about the best way to portray the property and the desirability or value of the property.
- We heard anecdotally from agents that sellers can take offense to staging suggestions. Conversely some sellers will direct agents on how they want the house to be digitally staged because they believe it will increase the desirability.
Preparing a home for sale can be an expensive and time consuming process.
-A majority of sellers reported undertaking staging efforts, either with a consultant or under agent advisement.
-A majority of sellers spend time repairing and updating the property to increase desirability/market value.
-We found that sellers who had lived in their home for decades, reported very lengthy and emotional preparation efforts (ie repairs, discard old belongings etc). This was in contrast to sellers who had lived at the property for shorter periods of time, and had far less emotional attachment to the property.
How might we help provide confidence of sale to sellers while reducing life disruption?
ARTIFACTS
Buyer Journey
Seller journey
RESEARCH DECK
