Purlend Design Brief: Branding & UI/UX

Created by Sydney Bocik · December 11, 2025 · Last updated March 13, 2026 · Category: Design

DISCLAIMER: This document was the initial design brief created, prior to the official PRD. Please review current product documentation for current scope.

1. About Purlend

Purlend is building the Digital Lending Highway, a platform that brings real underwriting to the start of the homebuying journey, giving buyers and their agents verified clarity before an offer is made.

We flip the mortgage process by prioritizing truth and affordability upfront, not just at closing. Our north star: create clarity and confidence from day one, reducing friction, waste, and emotional stress throughout the real estate transaction.

We believe design is fundamental to delivering that clarity, not just how it looks, but how it feels.

2. Why We're Hiring Design

We're preparing to launch our first MVP (Consumer Refinance Journey Clarity Engine) and grow into a fully branded platform under the Purlend identity from there. This requires an exceptional design partner to:

• Establish the brand for what will become a new category (The Digital Lending Highway)
• Help us communicate emotional clarity in a stressful decision process
• Design the first product experience that guides users with simplicity through a system that is complex under the hood

We're not just looking for contractors. We want a team that can think with us.

3. Project Scope

We're approaching this in phases. You may contribute to one or multiple areas, depending on your strengths. Ideally though we'd find one partner that can grow with us or one partner that's willing to work with the other on either brand or UI/UX.

PHASE 1: MVP & Brand Foundation

Launch Timeline: Q1 2026

Product Design

• Design UX/UI for borrower-facing MVP (Clarity Engine)
• Conversational AI helps homeowners explore refinance options with emotional intelligence
• MVP flow includes:
  • Document upload and borrower verification
  • Property data ingestion and eligibility outputs
  • Dynamic affordability and loan structuring outputs
  • Realtor/co-buyer collaboration views
• Design should reflect simplicity, trust, and forward motion
• Emphasis on clear next steps and calming user experience

Brand Design

• Evolve the existing Purlend identity (currently minimal Webflow site)
• Define logo, color, typography, imagery guidelines
• Align brand tone with our emotional goal: "confidence while searching"
• Visual identity must resonate with first-time buyers and be respected by lenders/partners

Website Design (Marketing)

• Refactor existing Purlend.com to:
  • Reflect new product messaging
  • Represent the category narrative: The Digital Lending Highway
  • Explain our difference clearly to borrowers, realtors, and lenders
  • Drive early interest, beta signups, and credibility
• Ideally built in Webflow with a CMS setup we can evolve internally

4. What We're Building (Vision)

This is not just a mortgage tool. It's an ecosystem shift.

STRUCTURE → SEARCH → SETTLE

We verify borrower and property at the beginning, not the end, so the deal can structure around them.

Emotional Impact

We want the design to carry the emotional weight of our product promise: clarity, calm, and confidence.

We're not just removing tasks. We're removing dread.

Audience

• First-time and move-up buyers
• Realtors and transaction coordinators
• Lending partners and underwriters

True Target Market

• Realtors and brokers in a B2B2C way
  • Purchases: We're going through the realtor for distribution to borrowers, putting our tools in the hands of realtors to make them the hero with their borrowers
  • Refinances: We're going through the broker for distribution to borrowers, putting our tools in the hands of realtors to make them the hero with their borrowers
• Primary messaging target is the realtor

4.1 Phase Approach from a UI/UX Perspective but Important to Consider for Branding

System 1: Consumer Refinance Journey (Clarity Engine)

Stage 1: Exploration. Conversational AI helps homeowners explore refinance options with emotional intelligence

Stage 2: Verification. Real numbers, verified scenarios with credit, income, and assets verified from the source

Stage 3: Fulfillment. Marketplace connects to the "best" lender to fulfill the recommendation that is hyper-personalized for the consumer's situation

Your immediate design scope: Stage 1 (6 weeks)

Your future scope: Stages 2-3 (Q2-Q3 2026)

System 2: Consumer Purchase Journey (Purlend)

Phase 1: Affordability Discovery. "What can I afford?" Personalized max (comfortable, stretch, absolute)

Phase 2: Home Search Integration. Design the home search experience that enables buyers to shop by their monthly payment. Show per-home affordability analysis ("This house = $2,840/month")

Phase 3: Pre-Qualification. Full pre-qual through our POS (point of sale system)

Phase 4: Digital Lending Experience. Complete consumer journey: Search, Pre-qual, Application, Underwriting, Closing, Settlement

Phase 5: Benefit Stacking. Veteran-focused optimization (VA loans, tax benefits, grants, down payment assistance)

Your immediate design scope: Phase 1-2 (6 weeks)

Your future scope: Phases 3-5 (2026-2027)

System 3: Professional Interfaces (B2B)

Realtor Dashboard. Track client pre-approvals, see affordability ranges, get notifications when clients view homes.

Lender Dashboard. Manage pipeline, review applications, communicate with borrowers, and track to closing.

Escrow/Title Interface. Coordinate closing, manage documents, track milestones

Your immediate design scope: None (2026)

Your future scope: All three (2026)

The Critical Design Challenge

You're not designing screens. You're creating the foundational system that enables all of this.

Design System Requirements:

• Must serve consumer AND professional experiences
• Must work for refinance AND purchase journeys
• Must scale from exploration (Stage 1) to full transaction (Stage 3)
• Must adapt to four decision-making archetypes
• Must integrate with external systems (MLS, credit bureaus, verification services, CRM, LOS, etc)
• Must feel cohesive as one platform, not fragmented products

The hard truth: If you design Clarity Engine Stage 1 without thinking about Purlend Phase 4 and the Lender Dashboard, we'll create technical debt that will be challenging to unwind later. Every decision in Phase 1 either enables or constrains what comes next.

4.2 Phase 1 Scope: What We're Building First

Timeline: 6 weeks, starting mid-January 2026

Deliverable 1: Design System Foundation

Typography, color, spacing, core components. Must be architected to scale to all three systems (consumer refinance, consumer purchase, professional interfaces).

Deliverable 2: Clarity Engine (Refinance Stage 1)

8 key moments (entry, conversation, scenario exploration, comparison, decision), desktop + mobile, interactive prototype

Deliverable 3: Purlend Affordability Discovery (Purchase Phase 1-2)

6 key moments (affordability discovery, home search integration, per-home breakdown, comparison), mobile-primary, integration specs

Deliverable 4: Forward-Looking Wireframes

Light wireframes showing how Stage 1 progresses to Stages 2-3. Not high-fidelity, but enough to prove the system scales.

5. Our Needs (What We're Looking For)

We need:

• Commitment to Phase 1 (confirmed, 6 weeks)
• Interest in Phases 2-3 (not binding, but mutual intent)
• Openness to multiple engagement models (contract, retainer, embedded)
• A UI/UX team that specializes in products for regulated, high-stakes decisions (e.g. fintech, proptech, health)
• A branding partner who understands emotional design and trust-building
• Comfort working in Figma, Miro, and ideally Webflow
• Strong systems thinking. We want design patterns we can scale
• Bonus: experience with home lending, real estate transactions, home portal and data experience (many regulations around IDX property data and how it can be shown), or U.S. financial compliance contexts

If you do either branding or UI/UX and NOT both, and have a trusted partner that you work with, we're happy to discuss with them as well to figure out how we might all be successful together.

You're the right partner if you:

• Think in platforms, not products. You've designed systems that serve multiple user types (consumer + professional) across multiple product areas.
• Want to be a founding design partner. You're not looking for a 6-week gig. You want to build something significant over 12-24 months.
• Understand mortgage/fintech/proptech. You've worked in financial products, real estate, or adjacent domains. You know why this is hard.
• Design for emotional complexity. You've designed experiences where someone's emotional state determines what they see and how they interact.
• Can work at a startup pace. 6 weeks for Phase 1 is real. You're comfortable with fast iteration, imperfect information, and building the plane while flying it.

You're not right for this if you:

• Only want project-based work (this is a partnership)
• Need extensive discovery/research phases (we move fast)
• Haven't designed complex, multi-sided platforms
• Think of design as "making things pretty" rather than solving systems problems

5.1 Partnership Structure

This is not a vendor relationship. This is a design partnership.

Phase 1 (Q1 2026): Foundation

• 6 weeks, full-time or near-full-time. Design system + Clarity Engine Stage 1 + Purlend Phase 1-2. Fixed fee or retainer.

Phase 2 (Q2-Q3 2026): Expansion

• Clarity Engine Stages 2-3 (verification + fulfillment). Purlend Phase 3 (pre-qualification). Ongoing retainer or embedded designer role.

Phase 3 (Q4 2026-2027): Platform Completion

• Purlend Phase 4-5 (digital lending + benefit stacking). Professional interfaces (realtor, lender, escrow/title). Could transition to a founding design role or an ongoing strategic partnership.

6. Why This Matters to Us: Founders Message

My father served in Vietnam, and when he came home, he was steered away from buying a home because of repeated human bias. Although he was fully qualified and could afford a house, he was told "he wasn't qualified, and he should look at a different neighborhood/community". No credit application, no employment or income verification. Just agents are lazy and biased. He's now in his 70s and still rents. My family has lived with housing instability my entire life because the mortgage system failed us.

We're building the platform that should have existed for him. And for millions of families like mine. The mortgage industry is stuck in the past. Applications are 40-page PDFs. Pre-approvals take 3 days. Nobody understands what they can afford. The tools are built for lenders, not people. We're fixing this, all of it. Consumer experience, professional workflow, purchase and refinance, search to settlement.

This is a 2-3-year build. We're looking for the design partner who wants to build it with us.

6. After Initial Call

To help you understand scope and direction, we'll be happy to share anything you need including but not limited to:

• Pitch Deck: High-level product and vision narrative
• MVP Product Brief: Functional flows, product behaviors, and experience goals for our first release
• Initial Design Scope Document: From our internal team

It would be great to see from you:

• Your vision for Phase 1: Given what you know about the full platform, how would you approach the first 6 weeks? What gets designed? What gets wireframed? What gets deferred?
• Two quick sketches: Clarity Engine scenario reveal + Purlend home search integration. Just enough to show your thinking.