Something different this week. I’ve shipped a product of my own, and it’s on the Mac App Store.
It’s called My House, My Things, and it does one thing: it keeps the record of a house.
The problem it solves is dull and universal
I couldn’t tell you when my boiler was last serviced. The serial number is on a sticker behind the flue, the installation date was in an email, the guarantee was in a folder somewhere, and the service history was in my head. Nor could I have told you what the kitchen paint was, or whether the dishwasher was still under warranty — which became relevant at the point it stopped draining. None of it was lost, exactly. Every answer existed somewhere, and none of them anywhere I could get to in under ten minutes, which for practical purposes is the same as not having them.
Everyone I’ve described this to has the same four places. Nobody has a list.
So the app is the list. Rooms, the things in them, what each cost and when its guarantee ends. The jobs that come back round: the boiler service, the gutters, the smoke alarms that expire on a printed date. And a log of everything that’s ever been done to the house, with what each visit cost and who did it.
When you sell, that log is the folder a buyer’s solicitor asks for. When you claim on insurance, it’s the schedule a claims handler wants emailed over.
Three decisions I’d defend
It lives on your Mac, as one file. No account, no sign-up, no server. Today the app has no permission to open a network connection at all. That isn’t a promise, it’s a setting. Export is a spreadsheet, one click, and the whole house backs up to a single file you keep wherever you like.
It’s bought once: £34.99, no subscription. A house is a thirty-year thing. The boiler’s guarantee is ten years, the roof is fifty, and the record has to outlast both. Renting software by the month to hold a list you already own means the day you stop paying is the day the list stops being yours, which is the opposite of what a record is for. I’ve written about why I’m charging once rather than monthly if you want the longer version.
There’s no AI in it. In 2026 that’s almost a feature. Nothing reads your house, nothing is sent anywhere, and there’s nothing to switch off. For anyone who does want it, there’s an open MCP server you can point your own assistant at. Bring your own; I supply the handle.
What shipping it taught me
Client work teaches you to build what’s asked for. Shipping your own product teaches you what it costs to be the one who decides.
App Review rejected it three times. The first was fair: close the main window and there was no menu item to reopen it. It’s a Mac convention I’d missed because I’d never closed it. The second was fairer still: the description mentioned an AI assistant, and the reviewer looked for one inside the app and couldn’t find it, because it’s a companion tool rather than a feature. The third was mine too. Each one cost days, and each one made the thing more honest.
That’s the part worth carrying back into client work. Everything that goes on a website is a claim someone can test. If a page says “integrates with X”, someone will try it on a Tuesday afternoon and find out. Writing only what you can demonstrate isn’t a constraint. It’s the difference between copy that survives contact and copy that doesn’t.
I also got a working answer to a question clients ask me constantly: what does it actually take to get on the App Store? Months of evenings, eleven days of review, and more care over the words than the code.
What’s next
For now, I’m conquering Macs. iPhones are next.
An iPhone companion is on the way, and with it iCloud sync, so the same record sits on both. It all stays inside the Apple ecosystem: your own iCloud account, never a server of mine, and no third party beyond what Apple itself provides. The rule doesn’t change. It’s your house, so it’s your file.
Have a look
It’s £34.99 on the Mac App Store and needs macOS 14 or later. There’s also a set of free guides on the site: what to record for home insurance, how long things actually last, a boiler service record you’ll actually keep. They’re useful whether or not you ever buy the app.
If you own a house and a Mac, I’d genuinely like to know what you’d put in first. It’s usually the boiler.
Josh Cox
I'm Josh — I build, host and look after WordPress sites (and increasingly fast Astro / Next.js builds) for Oxfordshire businesses, from Didcot, since 2016. I also tinker with a few products of my own on the side.
