Show HN: HomeownerLog – For tracking the tasks you complete around the house | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: HomeownerLog – For tracking the tasks you complete around the house

homeownerlog.com

58 pointszapstar23 comments

One weekend, I had somehow successfully repaired my dishwasher (turns out it was just a bad fuse that cost $10 to replace), and three smoke detectors simultaneously needed batteries replaced. So at that point, I realized:

1) I wish I could record this very proud achievement of mine (regarding the dishwasher). And also make a note of where I got the fuse, how I fixed it, etc., in case it broke again. 2) I wish that I kept better track of when I replaced my smoke detector batteries, along with other routine household activities.

And so here we are! This idea expanded into -- what if I could log whenever I did tasks like this around the house/yard and also jot down details (model numbers, battery types, etc.) about appliances and other household objects so that I could quickly reference them whenever they're needed.

Give it a try and let me know your thoughts, positive or negative!

Serious question: my wife seems to have a never ending list of these things and she would likely take it as some kind of passive-aggressive middle finger if I recorded all the stuff I did and then showed it to her. I think I'd rather keep it to myself unless she stumbles across me swearing at something with tools in my hands.

The fact that I find most of these domestic chores completely unfulfilling (i.e. just a long, constant reminder that buying a house means you suddenly realise that without you bashing on it, it will fall down in record time) is not something I want to be reminded of.

So, while I appreciate the idea, I just don't want to see how much of my "free" time is consumed with gardening, fixing stuff, honey do's etc. and I'd rather see a log of what I did with my hobbies instead. Kind of like the opposite to this.

Regardless of this app and speaking just as a spouse, I think it's important to feel like YOU accomplished something, regardless of whether anyone sees an official record saying that you did. Weekends fly by and I feel like I didn't tackle anything, but some sort of record (piece of paper, this website, etc.) can help remind me that, oh right, I did shovel the driveway five times and that's why I didn't get around to vacuuming the floors.

It is indeed a great feeling to see accomplishment logged somewhere online. But I would be encouraged to do so if others would be able to review it and then find inspiration to quest on their own similar endeavor. I'm thinking of Indie Hackers, for instance--it's very encouraging to read of another's success. My suggestion thus... allow for comments & discussion on any given entry. I could imagine myself commenting, "Good job with the carpentry! Did you use maple or oak?" Or something to that effect.

And maybe later on, rankings. As more accomplishments are entered, one goes from amateur to master to ninja, etc. But I don't think that's particularly important, just a thought. Either way, good job with HomeownerLog!

Not sure why you'd need or want a dedicated app for that? keep a paper notebook, or use a general purpose app ("notes", "word", etc) that is going to be around forever and be far more accessible? Using any app like this is a guarantee that the data will be lost down the road.

Yeah, that could absolutely be said for basically any website or app idea. And I totally get it. But there's sometimes a nice feeling to officially see your accomplishments logged somewhere. I focused on the ease-of-use -- click on the room, click one of the things in the room (that it already knows about from past interactions), and then click what you did to that thing (again, knowing what you've done to it in the past). It was a fun challenge.

In terms of data portability, one of the next features I'm working on is letting everyone easily download all of their data -- as JSON, XLSX, and CSV. Then you can leave whenever you choose.

Yes, but please read a little deeper into my comment. This should be more generalized. Tagged data with timestamps. Add a 'remind me' or 'frequency to check this' and you might have a thing. As it is now, I wouldn't even test it. If you want it to be a thing, it has to be better than a spreadsheet ...

I'd argue that you have to incorporate the calendar more usefully.

I love that someone downvoted my valid opinion! lol

For people who are looking for complex tasks and notes, I recommend org-mode + Orgzly app. The great thing is that you can create short tasks in the app, and you can expand it with more details on your computer later where it is synced. I use it for a wide range of different tasks.

Really nice idea!! I started building a product for creating single property pages over a year ago. One of the things I got asked was a way to use it to manage tasks / inventories for a home. At the time I was not able to implement that but I'm now thinking of going back to do that.

In the meantime I open sourced it so people can add functionality and take it in the direction they want.

This was the feedback I got on hacker news when I first discussed it:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24339608

Pretty cool! I do have a bit of a problem with forgetting that I was productive and assuming I am just not doing anything meaningful everyday. I also came across the idea of a "done list", but for anything, not just home stuff - I implemented it as a simple app[1] so that I can get points and track my week on a nice graph (inspired by Duolingo, I want to make a daily goal setting eventually too) :)

Your project reminded me of that.

[1] https://doneth.at - might be buggy and not very performant, I implemented it just for myself. I do hash passwords though ;)

I’ve been using something like this within Grocy, an open source grocery and household management tool. I find it very useful.

This is cool. I’m looking at purchasing a house soon and was looking for good ways to track the improvement projects I complete and their costs. (Ie installed new siding 1/23, $1,500). This looks great!

Good luck with your house hunt and if you start to use this, please don't hesitate to submit a few feature requests!

Do you have default tasks/templates homeowner users can pick from? For example, you’re supposed to drain your hot water heater annually and change the anode every 2-3 years.

Not currently but that’s something I’d like to add!

I do start all users off with a “default” house, so that it’s a little easier to get started.

I think this is using the Bulma css framework

It’s Bootstrap.

Pretty sweet idea! Thanks for sharing

Thank you! Please post any additional feedback or ideas that you care to share.

I would love to self-host this. Are there plans to release it outside of this service?

Same here - lacking that, some information on how it is hosted and what you plan to do with it (monthly subscription? Collecting the data for research?) would be nice before having to hand over an email address.

I plan to continue to offer it for free, as the costs are so minimal and I want to use this service myself anyway.

Eventually, I may offer very minimal text-based links to Amazon and other stores for relevant lightbulbs, batteries, etc. (when you click on a "thing" in your house), and those affiliate fees would be more than enough to cover my hosting costs. I want to be clear, those links would be something like "Find a replacement lightbulb on Amazon". That's it.

There is no intention of making this project a unicorn.

I don't have plans to release the source, but I do have plans to make the data easily downloadable.

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