The Apartment Hunt:
A Short Case to Bridge the Gap between Students Lack of Business
Experience and Learning to Define Information Requirements in
Accounting Information Systems or Managerial Accounting Courses
Delwyn D. DeVries
Assistant Professor
Belmont University
1900 Belmont Boulevard
Nashville, TN 37212-3757
devriesd@mail.belmont.edu
(615) 460-6930
Fax (615) 460-6353
Tanya Lee
Assistant Professor
Robert Morris University
6001 University Boulevard
Moon Township, PA 15108-1189
LeeTa@rmu.edu
(412) 397-4263
Fax (412) 397-2172
INTRODUCTION
Undergraduate students with little work experience have difficulty beginning to
learn managerial accounting and information systems concepts. These students have
little frame of reference to determine specific information needs for managerial decisions.
One way to attempt to bridge this gap between conceptual information requirements and
real world business processes is to design assignments that take advantage of experiences
common to many students, for example, searching for an apartment or a place to live.
Students’ prior experiences should aid learning about the conceptual task of defining
information needs. With this in mind, we ask students to define the information
requirements for deciding on an apartment. This is an introductory exercise that can be
used in either an accounting information systems (AIS) course focused on defining
information requirements or in a managerial accounting course focused on information
requirements for decision making.
IMPLEMENTATION
This apartment hunting case scenario can be used either as a written assignment
followed by class discussion or for class discussion alone. It is useful to assign it to
groups of students so that they can brainstorm to help generate more ideas. If students
work outside class before the in class discussion, they are more likely to generate a large
number of dimensions of decision related information. The case is suitable for use in an
AIS class during the introductory chapters, when students are beginning to consider the
general nature of information requirements in business. The assignment can be used as an
analogy – here is a way to approach identifying decision making needs in your personal
life and the same approach can be used in business life to define information
requirements. The case is also suitable for a managerial accounting class when discussing
how to identify relevant information for decision making.
This assignment should be done in teams of two or three to facilitate both idea
generation and accountability.
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The Assignment:
An information system should supply decision makers with information that is
relevant to their decision and as complete as possible (within cost/benefit constraints).
Thus, when designing an information system it is useful to consider a broad set of
information that could potentially be useful for decision making. The remainder of this
assignment will give you some practice thinking about how businesses define
information requirements by asking you to consider the information that you need to rent
your own apartment. You will be identifying all of the different dimensions of possible
information items that could be relevant to your apartment rental decision. If you don’t
ask for or search for the information, you won’t have that information when you need to
make a decision of whether or not to rent the apartment.
There are (at least) two different possible approaches to this assignment. One is to
think of general categories first:
1. Think of at least five possible categories of information that might be relevant to
this decision (one category could be “financial”) and list the categories.
2. Identify specific information items related to each category that you would like to
have when considering various apartments for rental (assume that you have a
choice). These information items can be phrased as questions (“How much is the
rent?” would be one under the Financial category) or statements (I’d like to know
how much the rent is.”) or as bullet points (“rent amount”).
Another approach is to first generate as many information items as you can and
then categorize them:
1. Identify specific information items that might be relevant to this decision. This is
a brainstorming exercise so think as broadly as possible. These information items
can be phrased as questions (“How much is the rent?”) or statements (I’d like to
know how much the rent is.”) or as bullet points (“rental amount”).
2. Take the set of information items you generated in step 1 and sort them into
general categories (such as “financial”). You should have at least five categories
(if not you may need to return to step 1 to generate more ideas!).
Deliverable:
Submit the completed assignment (as a Word document) in Blackboard. Bring a
paper copy to class as we will discuss the problem. (Note: the written portion of the
assignment can easily be omitted if desired.)
Hints:

Bullet points listing the categories and the information items you come up is
an efficient way to brainstorm and answer this problem. Another option is to
use index cards or slips of paper to identify single ideas for later sorting into
categories.
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
Consider the definitions of information qualities from Chapter 1 as you
prepare your answer.
TEACHING NOTES AND GRADING RUBRIC
The following is a list of typical categories for this assignment and of possible items
within those categories. A benefit of this exercise is that students are very willing to
share their do’s and don’ts of how to pick an apartment. The class discussion can be
quite lively as it focuses on issues relevant to the student’s personal lives.
1) Financial
a) Rent/security deposit
b) Utilities included or not (expected cost if not)
c) Cable TV included or not (expected cost if not)
d) Heat/air conditioning included or not (expected cost if not)
e) Who pays for repairs
f) Is there a fee for parking
g) How long is the lease
2) Location
a) Distance to work
b) Distance to school
c) Distance to bus stop/other mass transit
d) Distance to shopping/entertainment
e) Distance from neighboring dwellings
3) Apartment functionality
a) Number of rooms
b) Size of rooms
c) Is there storage space
d) Washer/dryer in apartment
e) Furnished or unfurnished
f) Light/windows
g) Is the landlord reliable (keeping up with maintenance, returning security deposits)
h) Are pets allowed
i) Security level of apartments (type of locks on doors, secure lobby, lighting
outside)
j) Is the apartment clean and in good condition
4) Apartment complex facilities/rules
a) Gym
b) Pool
c) Laundry facilities
d) Covered parking
e) Tennis/basketball courts
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f) Is there room for visitors to park
g) Does the building (and its grounds) appear to be in good repair and clean
h) Rules on smoking, visitors, “noise” curfew
5) Neighborhood
a) Nature of local government (parking rules, fees)
b) Quality of local school district (for those with children)
c) Crime rate
d) Condition of roads
e) Nature of neighbors
f) Expected noise levels (airport nearby, highway nearby, sports facilities nearby)
The class discussion is a good opportunity to talk about the level of detail that is
required to identify information that can be defined, is specific, relevant, and can be
collected. It is also important to link the apartment hunt categories and information items
to decision making and information concepts from the related managerial or accounting
information systems classes. The next 2 sections give additional specific guidance for
using the case in either an AIS or a managerial accounting class.
Using the Case in Accounting Information Systems Classes:
This case is a good introduction to the concept of information and is appropriate
early in the semester of an accounting information systems class. Chapter 1, Introduction
of Accounting Information Systems, is the relevant chapter for an AIS class using either
the Gelinas and Dull or the Romney and Steinbart AIS textbooks. Students taking this
course generally have little prior work experience other than in retailing and have limited
accounting course work as well. The course is often taken before many of the discipline
specific courses for an accounting (or finance) major.
Students can be asked very early in the course to generate a broad based list of
requirements for making a good apartment hunt decision. Even at this point, students will
have a high level of confidence in their ability to complete this task. Generating the list of
information needed and the categories these items relate to can help them understand
what information systems can – and should – do for business organizations.
The large variety of information that could be included in an information system
is frequently difficult for students to grasp. An organization’s information systems
broadly cover the enterprise, operations, and accounting transactions. Students have some
experience with accounting transactions and balances from principles of accounting. But
business decisions require not only financial information but also information on markets,
competitors, regulators and other value-chain participants. As students learn about
business processes, they will need to consider information needs beyond the accounting
transaction, such as vendor performance or pre-sales marketing information. This case
provides an example relevant to students demonstrating the breadth of financial and nonfinancial information that is needed for a good decision even when that decision is short
term and relatively straightforward.
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Using the Case in Managerial Accounting Classes:
This case can be used early in an upper level managerial accounting class, where
students already have a grasp of the kinds of decisions managers can face, or late in an
introductory class to tie together the topics covered. In both, it can help students to
understand the crucial nature of decision relevant information.
1) Financial can be linked to capital budgeting and operational budgeting through
original cost for various alternatives, ongoing maintenance costs, appropriate
timeframes for analysis, cost management.
2) Location can be linked to capital budgeting and decision making through relevant
considerations for choosing a site for a distribution center or a production facility.
3) Apartment functionality and apartment complex facilities can be linked to
decision making related to facility renovations or determining needs for future
construction.
4) Apartment complex rules can be linked to decision making related to capital
budgeting or the need to provide information related to legal requirements (local
taxes, laws, regulations; environmental laws and regulations; local cultural
differences related to operations).
5) Neighborhood can be related to local requirements (as in the preceding item) or to
local workforce availability for either new facilities or future needs for current
facilities.
Grading Written Assignments:
When this case is used as a written assignment, responses will vary widely in their
comprehensiveness and focus on the objective. Grading can be simplified by either
providing a set of categories for students to work with or by soliciting a set of categories
in the class before the assignment is due. This set of common categories reduces
variability, focuses students on general areas of information to consider, and reduces the
difficulty of comparing student responses and assigning grades.
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