Housing Literacy

Online tool annotating NYC rent regulations, empowering rent-stabilized tenants and supporting advocates with accessible resources, policy analysis, and data tools.

Housing Literacy: A Tool for Understanding Rent Regulation

Research driven

I created Housing Literacy, with the help of Partner & Partners, to be an online resource that makes New York City’s rent regulations more transparent and accessible for everyday New Yorkers. The platform annotates all of the legal documents that rent-stabilized tenants might encounter throughout their tenancy, promoting greater understanding of rights and responsibilities. To accomplish this, I used a user research approach (UX).

Key Contributions / UX Research Approach:

  • Conducted stakeholder interviews with tenants, housing advocates, and housing lawyers to identify pain points around confusion in rent regulations and lack of transparency.
  • Identified and validated user needs: tenants struggled with limited access to clear explanations of rent-stabilization rights and responsibilities.
  • Synthesized insights from the New York City housing agency, New York University’s Furman Center, the Rent Guidelines Board, and New York State Department of Housing and Community Renewal reports and decisions to confirm policy gaps and inform solution design.
  • Developed a communication framework to translate complex regulations into accessible language and clear document annotations for everyday New Yorkers.
  • Designed and built Housing Literacy, an online tool that made legal housing documents more transparent and user-friendly for rent-stabilized tenants.
  • Created resources for housing advocates, enabling them to better educate and support tenants through accessible, data-driven housing information.
  • Leveraged technical expertise (GitHub, Python, QGIS, Stata) for website development, spatial analysis, and statistical modeling to inform and scale the solution.


An example of how a standard lease is annotated.


Some example annotations.


Community-Oriented (advocacy/tenant audience)

I also wanted Housing Literacy to be an online tool that housing advocates could use to help educate their constituents and clients. Through stakeholder interviews, I learned that lawyers lacked an easy way to highlight key information in leases and other housing documents for their clients. Many tenants also misplaced paper handouts or meeting notes. To address these challenges, I developed a website that annotates all relevant legal documents, providing clear explanations and linking to important resources. This allows lawyers to efficiently guide clients and enables tenants to access the information anytime, helping them navigate housing issues more confidently.

Key Contributions / UX Research Approach:

  • Conducted stakeholder interviews with lawyers and housing advocates to identify gaps in how tenants receive and understand legal information.
  • Developed personas and user journeys for tenants and advocates to inform design decisions.
  • Iteratively tested the website with users to ensure clarity and accessibility of annotations.
  • Provided a central online hub that consolidates legal documents, annotations, and policy resources, reducing reliance on paper handouts.
  • Used data and mapping tools (Python, R, GitHub) to analyze housing policy and support design decisions.


Easily accesible housing resources with links to where they can find more information.

References