MVP to a multi-platform real estate app using Decoupled Drupal
PRODUCT CONSULTING
DECOUPLED DRUPAL
UI/UX DESIGN
FRONTEND ENGINEERING
Client Overview
Our client is an upcoming housing startup from Panama connecting buyers and sellers in the real estate market. We partnered with our client for product consulting to build the MVP backlog, used Design thinking to rapidly test ideas with real-world beta users and finally delivered UX optimised and high-performance web and mobile app both powered by Decoupled Drupal as the backend.
MONTHS REQUIRED FROM IDEATION TO LAUNCH
PROPERTIES LISTED IN 3 MONTHS
AUTOMATED HOUSE-PRICE PREDICTION VIA MACHINE LEARNING
Client Requirements
-
A platform for property dealers in Panama and property buyers across locations to connect
-
Dealers app and Buyers app with a common backend i.e Drupal
-
Web application in Angular JS
-
Android and iOS app development
Discovery (Product Consulting)
We built the MVP backlog for the product to prioritize stories with high value and low cost. The client engaged real-life stakeholders from their network to fill out surveys that helped us understand buyer and seller problems in high detail. After receiving 100’s of responses to our surveys, evaluating the cost to benefit of we soon realised that the following features were going to be critical for the product :
-
Buyer and Seller verification
-
Real-time communication between buyers and sellers
-
Capturing a high amount of data about properties
-
Bulk import of properties from excel / MLS systems
-
Mobile solution for inventory management
-
Decision Driven Search System
-
UX/UI to be a key differentiator
Designing the Product
Thanks to our discovery, we had a lean and crisp backlog for the MVP and a lot of clarity on what we were building. Our next task was to design the product and test our solutions, some of the key guidelines for the design team were:
-
Action-based UX
-
Component-based design for elements to be reusable across web and mobile
-
Minimalist Design with a focus on important actions
-
Design for performance
Verified Buyers
Bulk import of property database
Chat-based contact centre to have conversations with potential buyers
Mobile App to easily publish and manage listings
Verified Buyers
Bulk import of property database
Chat-based contact centre to have conversations with potential buyers
Mobile App to easily publish and manage listings
Verified Buyers
Bulk import of property database
Chat-based contact centre to have conversations with potential buyers
Mobile App to easily publish and manage listings
Verified Buyers
Bulk import of property database
Chat-based contact centre to have conversations with potential buyers
Mobile App to easily publish and manage listings
Verified Buyers
Bulk import of property database
Chat-based contact centre to have conversations with potential buyers
Mobile App to easily publish and manage listings
Building the app
Looking at product and UX needs of our client we soon realised that we would need a distributed architecture of 3rd party systems backed by API First Drupal deployment also known as Decoupled Drupal.
Our tech stack included the following frameworks and systems:
-
Decoupled Drupal - CMS and REST point provider for various functionality.
-
Angular - Web application consuming data from Drupal and other services.
-
Ionic - Hybrid Mobile app for Android and iOS with Drupal as functionality Backend.
-
Firebase - Realtime Database to power buyer and seller chats.
-
Elastic Search -To power faceted and geospatial search queries from the web and mobile app.
-
External XML Feeds - Property data from third-party XML feeds were synced to Drupal periodically.
Transformed the idea to MVP in 5 months
18,000 properties listed in 3 months
Implemented Machine Learning (House-price prediction) to educate users around the price estimations
Decision driven user experience improving customer’s trust
Enhanced and search flow optimized for the real estate sector
Reshape your business with our Drupal Development Services.
