HouseChief questions and answers

HouseChief is a family organizer with an AI chief of staff: a shared calendar, chores with stars and rewards, weekly meals and a recipe box, grocery and other lists, to-dos and projects, and an assistant that plans with parents and asks before it changes anything. It's for parents and kids in one household. Built by a Dallas family for their own home, it's now in early access for other families.

Free while in early access; pricing will be announced before any charge. There are no plans, trials or paid tiers, and no ads. Everything described on this site, including the AI Chief of Staff, is included.

It works on all of them, in the browser. HouseChief is a web app: open housechief.app on an iPhone, Android phone, tablet or computer and sign in. Add it to your Home Screen and it opens like an app, with notifications. There is no App Store or Google Play app to download.

Yes, all three sync two ways. Each parent connects their own Google, iCloud or Outlook account, chooses the calendars to show, and picks where HouseChief's events are copied; you can also choose the calendar per event. Personal Outlook accounts work, as do most Microsoft 365 work or school accounts, though some workplaces need IT approval first. Details on the family calendar page.

No. Kids are profiles inside the family with no login, email or phone. A parent adds them with a name, a color and an emoji, and any signed-in device can switch to a kid's view, where they see their chores and the to-dos assigned to them. A parent PIN keeps kids from switching back into a parent's view.

No. Calendar and meal changes, list edits, emails, new projects and anything it would submit on a website arrive as cards and wait for a parent's Approve. The one direct action is adding items to a list when you ask, which comes with Undo. Kids never use the Chief of Staff; their Buddy is read-only.

Everything you add belongs to your family's household and is seen only by your family, plus anyone you give a read-only share link. There are no ads, no ad or analytics trackers, and data is never sold. There's no location tracking. The plain-language privacy summary and the privacy and safety page have the detail.

Yes. Sign in on any tablet or spare screen with a browser, and open housechief.app/display (add HouseChief to the Home Screen for a full-screen view). It shows today and tomorrow, each kid's chores with big checkboxes, dinner, the grocery list and the weather, refreshes every minute, keeps the screen awake where the browser allows and dims at night. See wall display.

Forward them to your family's own HouseChief address (shown in Settings → Forward emails). HouseChief pulls out the dates and to-dos and puts them in your Inbox with a push to your phone; tap Approve and they go on the calendar. Only a parent's own email address can send to it, and HouseChief never needs access to your mailbox. See email to calendar.

There's no importer, so not in one click. Calendars come across by connecting Google Calendar, iCloud or Outlook (two-way) or adding another calendar's ICS link (read-only), including a read-only feed published from Cozi. Lists and recipes are re-entered or pasted to your Chief of Staff to add. Our Cozi comparison walks through it.

Yes. Make a read-only share link in Settings and send it to them. They open it in any browser without an account and see the schedule only; lists, notes and settings are never shown. Turn the link off whenever you like. The HouseChief calendar can also be subscribed to from their own calendar app, view-only.

Yes. HouseChief works as a custom connector for Claude and ChatGPT. Once connected (Settings → AI assistants shows how), your own assistant can look up the family's calendar, meals and lists and add items to a list or the Inbox for approval, nothing more. It can't edit events, send email or change settings, and you can disconnect it any time.

In Settings, the account owner chooses Delete family account, enters the family name and their password, and the family's data is deleted. A parent who isn't the owner can delete their own account from Settings, which removes their sign-in and their own data but keeps the family's for the other parent.

Go to /join. Depending on the current early-access setting, you either create your family right away with your name, email, a family name and a password and confirm by email, or request an invite that's approved by hand and arrives as a sign-in link. Setup then takes an evening: add the kids, invite the other parent if there is one, connect your calendars.