Privacy Policy

1. The short version

• We collect the information you give us (account info, project details, documents you upload) and information generated by your use of the platform (property reports, search history, login records).
• We use this information to deliver the platform, to improve our cost estimates and AI tools, and to keep your account secure.
• We do not sell your personal information.
• We use de-identified property and project data to train our AI models and to publish market research.
• You can edit your profile, change your notification preferences, download your data, and close your account from Settings › Profile.

The rest of this policy is the long version.

2. Information we collect

You give us

• Account info: name, email, phone number, password (stored hashed), the property address you sign up with.
• Project info: project type, scope, budget, photos, plans, notes, messages you send to contractors or to our AI tools.
• Communications: emails and messages you send us through support or in-platform messaging.
• Payment info: when you pay for HONEYCOMB features, our payment processor (Stripe) handles your card details. We receive non-sensitive metadata such as the last four digits, card brand, and billing zip.

We generate, on your behalf

• Property reports, comparable sales analyses, permit timelines, and cost estimates for the addresses you analyze.
• Project estimates and recommendations based on your scope and finishes.
• Activity records: login times, IP address, device type, pages you visit inside the platform, AI tools you use.

We obtain from third parties

• Public records (property tax records, deeds, permits, zoning data) for the addresses you analyze.
• Market data (comparable sales, listing data, regional pricing) from real-estate data providers.
• Service-provider logs from infrastructure partners (hosting, email delivery, error monitoring).

3. How we use your information

We use your information to:

• Deliver the platform — show you your property report, save your projects, send the messages and notifications you ask for.
• Keep your account secure — detect suspicious logins, send you login alerts, prevent fraud.
• Improve our cost estimates and AI tools — see Section 4 below for the detail.
• Communicate with you about your projects (transactional emails and SMS) and, if you opt in, about new features and market research (marketing emails).
• Comply with our legal obligations and enforce our Terms of Service.

4. AI training, market research, and your content

This is the part of the policy that matters most for HONEYCOMB and we want to be plain about it.

HONEYCOMB's value to homeowners — accurate cost estimates, fair contractor matches, reliable permit timelines — comes from the dataset of properties, projects, and outcomes we accumulate across our entire member base. To keep that dataset useful, we use:

• The property data we generate for any address analyzed on the platform (the report, the comparable sales, the permit lookup, the zoning summary).
• The project parameters you enter (project type, square footage, finishes, regional pricing, scope) — in de-identified form, meaning the data is not linked to your name, email, or phone number.
• The anonymous patterns in how members use the platform (which AI tools they use, which questions they ask, how they refine their projects).

We use this data to:

• Train and improve the AI models that power our cost estimates, recommendations, and Knowledge Bee answers.
• Generate market research and aggregate reports that we publish or share with members.
• Improve the contractor matching, permit timeline, and cost calibration features over time.

What this means concretely for our AI assistants ("Bees"). When you ask a question of any HONEYCOMB AI assistant — Knowledge Bee, Material Bee, Task Bee, Blueprint Bee, Extract Bee, Validation Bee, RFI Bee, or any future Bee — we log the question text, the response, the timestamp, the project it relates to, and which Bee answered. We use these logs to (a) improve the answer quality over time, (b) detect and correct hallucinations or low-quality responses, (c) generate aggregate, de-identified market research, and (d) train and fine-tune the AI models that power future Bee responses. We do not share the raw question text with any third party other than the AI providers (OpenAI, Anthropic) we use to generate the response in the first place. The aggregate counts from this logging are visible in your account if you ever want to see what we've recorded; admins on our side can see them at any time.

We do not sell your personal information to third parties. We do not sell de-identified data to data brokers. The only situation in which any of this data leaves HONEYCOMB is when an infrastructure partner needs to process it on our behalf (Section 5 below) or when the law requires us to disclose it (Section 7 below).

5. Who we share information with

We share information only in the following situations:

• Service providers that help us run the platform — hosting (Replit, Google Cloud), email delivery (SendGrid), SMS delivery (Twilio), payments (Stripe), error monitoring (Sentry), AI providers (OpenAI, Anthropic). These providers are contractually limited to processing data on our behalf.
• Contractors and HONEYCOMB members you choose to share information with — for example, when you request a bid, the contractor sees your project details and contact info.
• Other HONEYCOMB portals (contractor, developer, investor) can see property data, including data sourced from your activity, but only behind our membership wall and only in formats comparable to consumer-facing real-estate services like Redfin or Zillow. We never publish your name, contact info, or private project notes to other members.
• Legal disclosures when required by law, court order, or to protect HONEYCOMB, our members, or the public.
• Business transfers — if HONEYCOMB is acquired or merges with another company, your information may transfer to the new entity, subject to this Privacy Policy or its equivalent.

We do not sell your personal information. This is a commitment, not just a policy default. Selling member data would compromise the trust that makes our platform work.

6. Account deletion and what happens to your data

You can ask us to delete your HONEYCOMB account at any time from Settings › Profile.

When you do, we will permanently remove:

• Your profile (name, phone number, email, login)
• Documents and photos you uploaded to your projects
• Your project notes, messages, and saved estimates that identify you

Because HONEYCOMB exists to help homeowners get accurate quotes, fair contractor matches, and reliable cost estimates, some information stays in the platform after your account is closed, in a de-identified form:

• The property analysis and report we generated for your address
• Permit, zoning, comparable sales, and market data for your property
• The anonymized project parameters (scope, square footage, finishes, regional pricing) we used to estimate your project

This residual data is no longer linked to you personally. It joins the broader market dataset that powers our cost estimates, contractor recommendations, and AI tools for every other homeowner using HONEYCOMB. We use it for property and market research and to train our AI models. We do not sell it to third parties.

If you would like a copy of everything we hold about you before deletion, you can download it from Settings › Profile.

Process

1. When you click delete, we sign you out, mark your account closed, and email you a confirmation.
2. For 30 days after that, your account can be restored by contacting support — useful if you change your mind or didn't actually mean to delete.
3. After 30 days, the personal information described above is permanently scrubbed from our systems and our backups, on the schedule those backups roll. The de-identified residual data continues to live in the platform.

7. Legal requests

We may disclose your information when we are required to by law (subpoena, court order, regulatory request) or when we reasonably believe disclosure is necessary to protect HONEYCOMB, our members, or the public from harm or fraud. When we can, we will tell you about a legal request before responding to it.

8. Security

We protect your information with industry-standard safeguards including encryption in transit (TLS), encryption of passwords (Firebase-managed hashing), access controls on internal systems, and audit logging of administrative actions. No security program is perfect. If we ever experience a breach that affects you, we will notify you as required by law.

9. Your choices and rights

You can:

• See and edit your profile in Settings › Profile.
• Manage how we contact you in Settings › Notifications (per-channel email and SMS toggles by event).
• Opt out of marketing emails at any time using the unsubscribe link in any marketing email, or by unchecking the marketing toggle in Settings › Notifications.
• Download your data in Settings › Profile (we'll email you a link to a downloadable archive).
• Delete your account as described in Section 6.
• Reach a human by emailing privacy@honeycombusa.com.

If you are a California resident, you have additional rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act ("CCPA"), including the right to know what we collect, the right to deletion (subject to the residual-data carve-out in Section 6), and the right not to be discriminated against for exercising those rights. We honor verified CCPA requests at the email address above.

If you are in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, you have rights under the GDPR including access, rectification, erasure (subject to Section 6), and the right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority. The legal basis for our processing is (a) the contract you have with us when you create an account, (b) our legitimate interest in operating, securing, and improving the platform, and (c) your consent for marketing communications.

10. Marketing emails — your opt-in choice

When you create a HONEYCOMB account, the signup form asks you whether you'd like to receive optional marketing emails ("Tips, new features, and market reports"). The checkbox is unchecked by default — we will only send you these emails if you affirmatively opt in. Transactional emails about your account, your projects, your bids, and your security are sent regardless and are governed by your settings in Settings › Notifications.

You can change your marketing preference at any time in Settings › Notifications, or by clicking the unsubscribe link in any marketing email.

11. SMS messages

If you provide a phone number, we may send you SMS messages about your project (appointment reminders, contractor messages, security alerts). Standard message and data rates from your carrier may apply. You can reply STOP to any HONEYCOMB SMS to immediately opt out of all platform SMS messages, or you can manage SMS per event in Settings › Notifications.

12. Children

HONEYCOMB is not directed to children under 18, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18. If you believe a child has given us personal information, contact us at privacy@honeycombusa.com and we will delete it.

13. International users

HONEYCOMB is based in the United States and stores data in the United States. If you use the platform from outside the U.S., you understand that your information will be transferred to and processed in the U.S., which may have different privacy laws than your country.

14. Changes to this Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make material changes — especially changes to how we use your data for AI training or marketing — we will notify you by email or in-platform before the changes take effect. The "Last Updated" date at the top of this page reflects the latest version.

15. Contact us

For privacy questions, requests, or concerns, email privacy@honeycombusa.com.