Location, location, location. Of course there are other things that come into play when looking for a place to live, but oftentimes the first step is choosing a location. RentLingo, a social media based, real estate rental application, takes the location quest 10 steps further. By creating connections with your Facebook friends and aggregating the entire population of existing apartment and home listings from the Internet, RentLingo is able to provide users the best possible viewpoint of a neighborhood.

Beyond apartment hunters, RentLingo is also offering REIT, landlords and owners unique tools to improve the quality of renters, lead management and ultimately the rental process as a whole. For a brand to successfully communicate with two distinct target markets, quite a bit of research and due diligence is required. Luckily, the men behind RentLingo were well aware of the importance of preparedness and forethought.

Dan Laufer, president and founder of RentLingo, came to us with all his ducks in a row – a finalized business plan, site plan (essentially a blue print of what the site should include and where things should go when finished), wireframe designs of each page (basic layout of a page sans the design) and a specific vision for the aesthetic. He and his development team had spent months shaping the concept, the functionality of their product and the technical requirements that would make it all possible, allowing us to focus solely on fine tuning their brand and creating an intuitive user interface.

Having partnered with a variety of development teams over the years, we’ve learned how important it is to start the partnership off on the right foot. So prior to designing, we reached out to Dan and his team to confirm development constraints and design specifications. By initially communicating needs and maintaining an open-door policy for questions and requests throughout the project, we were able to create designs that were easy for the developers to work with and apply.

Today, the application is live in beta and as with most tools in today’s marketplace, it is bound to metamorphosize over time. However, because of the initial partnership between our design team and the RentLingo management and development team the site can evolve without losing its foundation. No matter who you work with or the vision of your brand, it is important to remember that planning is a priority and finding capable teams that can amicably work together is key.

So, who’s ready to look for a new apartment?