Hallway
Mobile App Design
Problem: condominium complaints keep coming back to fees, unclear accounts and repairs with no answer, and almost a quarter of residents are 65 or older.
What I did: desk research, three key flows, a mobile app with a large-text mode, and a heuristic review of my own screens.
Outcome: a 70-year-old can pay, report and vote alone, by design. 10 issues found, 4 major, all fixed. Not yet tested with residents.
Hallway is a concept for a condominium app for apartment buildings in Portugal, made for residents of every age and for the administrator, whether a professional firm or an elected neighbour. Residents pay fees, report issues and follow them to the end, and take part in meetings from their phone.
Role:
Product Designer
Year:
2026
Explore the full story –
Challenge
Complaints about condominiums in Portugal keep coming back to the same problems: fees in arrears, accounts that are hard to follow, documents that are hard to get and repairs with no answer. The main Portuguese app I found is rated 1.9/5 on the App Store, and 23.4% of the population is 65 or older (Census 2021).
Objective
An app a 70-year-old neighbour can use as easily as a 30-year-old: large text and few steps, the fee and building news on the home screen, issues everyone can follow, meetings in person or by video as Law 8/2022 allows, early votes, and accounts open to every resident.
Results
Desk research shaped three decisions: one shared issue timeline instead of duplicate reports, early voting with a live quorum in plain language, and arrears shown without names. A heuristic review of my own screens found 10 issues, 4 of them major, all fixed and shown before and after. Not yet tested with residents.
Key insight
Residents don't need another way to complain. They need to see that a neighbour already reported it, and what happens next.
Process
Discover. INE Census data, the condominium law after Law 8/2022, complaints from DECO and Portal da Queixa, and six condominium apps and their reviews.
Define. Four jobs: pay the fee, report and follow a problem, get documents, take part in meetings. Rule: if a 70-year-old can't do it alone, it isn't done.
Map and design. Three flows with a way out at every step, then mobile screens with large touch targets, plain language and a large-text mode.
Review and fix. A heuristic review found 10 issues. The 4 major ones: votes in permillage most people can't read, votes sent with no review, documents with no visible way in, and secondary text too small for older eyes.
Walk through. A cognitive walkthrough with proto-personas based on desk research (not interviews) predicted 5 more issues, W1–W5. All five are fixed: a guided MB WAY step with a Multibanco fallback, a one-time text size prompt, a “Me too” action that tells residents the administration already knows, and a tenant view that explains voting is for owners, with a proxy request.
Success metrics
These are the targets I would use to judge a pilot. They are goals, not measured results: the product has not been built or tested.
At least 80% of monthly fees paid in the app by the due date.
In a usability test, at least 4 of 5 residents aged 65 or older pay the fee without help.
Duplicate issue reports cut by half, as residents follow existing reports instead.
Early votes covering at least 30% of the permillage before each meeting.
Shipped & next
Left out on purpose: the administrator's back office, accounting integration and a neighbours' chat, which would need moderation a small building can't provide.
Next: a test with five residents of different ages, at least two over 65: pay the fee, report the stair light, vote early on the roof repair. Then a WCAG 2.1 AA review.