Product Design, Brand-Aligned UI, Workshops
Avalon Invest
A dual-role mobile app for buying fractional shares of a closed real estate fund, with copy that's honest about how slow real money moves.
Industry
Investment, Real Estate, FinTech
Services Provided
Product Design, Brand-Aligned UI, Workshops
Duration
2 weeks
Deliverables
Mobile prototype
KYC flows
Investment and exit flows
Dual-role app architecture
Time-travel demo simulator
Mobile prototype
KYC flows
Single page
Investment and exit flows
Single page
Dual-role app architecture
Single page
Time-travel demo simulator
Single page
Mobile prototype
KYC flows
Investment and exit flows
Dual-role app architecture
Time-travel demo simulator
About the Project
Avalon runs a closed real estate fund for Ukrainian high net worth clients. The first fund, Avalon Prime, pays 12.5% per year, quarterly. To get in, you fill paperwork, share an IBAN, sign things, and wait for a bank to confirm a transfer.
Real estate doesn't move at app speed, and pretending otherwise costs trust. My job was a mobile app that walks the investor through the paperwork and shows the yield honestly, including the days when nothing visibly happens.
Avalon runs a closed real estate fund for Ukrainian high net worth clients. The first fund, Avalon Prime, pays 12.5% per year, quarterly. To get in, you fill paperwork, share an IBAN, sign things, and wait for a bank to confirm a transfer.
Real estate doesn't move at app speed, and pretending otherwise costs trust. My job was a mobile app that walks the investor through the paperwork and shows the yield honestly, including the days when nothing visibly happens.
Challenge
The minimum first investment is 1.8 million UAH. A single signup mistake is expensive. People do not click "agree" twice as fast at that price.
Returns are quarterly. Most investment apps show second-by-second portfolio updates that would be actively misleading here.
The app serves two roles: investor (B2C) and Avalon manager (internal). One codebase, two clearly separate experiences, no confusion between them.
The minimum first investment is 1.8 million UAH. A single signup mistake is expensive. People do not click "agree" twice as fast at that price.
Returns are quarterly. Most investment apps show second-by-second portfolio updates that would be actively misleading here.
The app serves two roles: investor (B2C) and Avalon manager (internal). One codebase, two clearly separate experiences, no confusion between them.
Focus
This audience does not want a Robinhood. They want a quarterly statement, a fund report PDF, and a manager's phone number. Build trust through honest copy. Animations don't earn it.
This audience does not want a Robinhood. They want a quarterly statement, a fund report PDF, and a manager's phone number. Build trust through honest copy. Animations don't earn it.
Solution
A single-fund mobile app with two moves that earned their place. Every flow is honest about latency: "Funds reserved. Awaiting bank confirmation, around 5 seconds" instead of a fake progress bar.
The dashboard has a time-travel toggle for demos that compresses a quarter into 20 seconds, so investors can see how dividends accrue without waiting three months for the punchline.
The manager role gets a separate dashboard that approves or rejects applications and never touches the investor-facing UI. One codebase, two minds.
A single-fund mobile app with two moves that earned their place. Every flow is honest about latency: "Funds reserved. Awaiting bank confirmation, around 5 seconds" instead of a fake progress bar.
The dashboard has a time-travel toggle for demos that compresses a quarter into 20 seconds, so investors can see how dividends accrue without waiting three months for the punchline.
The manager role gets a separate dashboard that approves or rejects applications and never touches the investor-facing UI. One codebase, two minds.
Approach
Empathise
Two workshops with prospective investors, three with internal managers. Surfaced the trust gap: this audience wants explanations more than interactions.
Define
Mapped the investment flow against legal reality (IBAN, signature, payment verification, three-day deadline). Each UI step matches a step the law requires, which keeps the design honest by default.
Ideate
Three dashboards on the table: portfolio-first, fund-first, activity-first. Portfolio-first won, with a forecasted-yield line that translates "12.5%" into "here's what you'll see in three months".
Prototype
Built the mobile prototype in React with shadcn/ui and Recharts. State in a single context, manual navigation that mirrors how the screens were sketched in Figma.
Test
Five sessions with investors, two with managers. The missing answer was "what happens if my payment fails", so I added explicit recovery copy to every payment screen. Investors trusted the app more after that, not less.
Empathise
Two workshops with prospective investors, three with internal managers. Surfaced the trust gap: this audience wants explanations more than interactions.
Define
Mapped the investment flow against legal reality (IBAN, signature, payment verification, three-day deadline). Each UI step matches a step the law requires, which keeps the design honest by default.
Ideate
Three dashboards on the table: portfolio-first, fund-first, activity-first. Portfolio-first won, with a forecasted-yield line that translates "12.5%" into "here's what you'll see in three months".
Prototype
Built the mobile prototype in React with shadcn/ui and Recharts. State in a single context, manual navigation that mirrors how the screens were sketched in Figma.
Test
Five sessions with investors, two with managers. The missing answer was "what happens if my payment fails", so I added explicit recovery copy to every payment screen. Investors trusted the app more after that, not less.
Value Delivered
A 30-minute manager call becomes a 5-minute self-serve flow. The manager stays available for the one-in-ten investor who genuinely wants the call, which is the better use of their time anyway.
The time-travel simulator turned out to be the single demo move that closed pitch meetings. People who'd never opened an investment app became the source of truth for both this CRM and the paired Avalon Invest app.
A 30-minute manager call becomes a 5-minute self-serve flow. The manager stays available for the one-in-ten investor who genuinely wants the call, which is the better use of their time anyway.
The time-travel simulator turned out to be the single demo move that closed pitch meetings. People who'd never opened an investment app became the source of truth for both this CRM and the paired Avalon Invest app.
12.5% annual yield
modelled with a 6-month forecast curve
1.8M UAH
minimum first investment
2 user roles
handled in one codebase
2 exit paths designed
buyback queue (3 to 6 months) and P2P resale
12.5% annual yield
modelled with a 6-month forecast curve
1.8M UAH
minimum first investment
2 user roles
handled in one codebase
2 exit paths designed
buyback queue (3 to 6 months) and P2P resale
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