Homesy Community Standards
At Homesy, we’re building a new kind of real estate — a place where people profile their own homes and explore new homes in a digital community that’s all about our common experience in the real estate market whether we’re buyers, sellers, renters, owners, brokers, landlords, other real estate professionals, or just here to have fun.
We know people have strong opinions about their homes and often have disagreements about everything from the borders of our property, to getting hot water, or even finding a home. We get it. That’s why we’re here: to give you a voice. Everyone’s got a real estate story, and now you have a place to tell it. Everyone is welcome here, worthy of respect and safety, even when we disagree.
That’s why we’ve created these Community Standards: to outline how we expect our users to behave and to be clear from the start about what is and isn’t allowed on Homesy.
We’ve organized our Community Standards into four sections:
Civility & Respect
Fairness & Transparency
Security & Privacy
Safety
These standards apply to all of your actions on Homesy and with other Homesys, both online and at real-world events we may host. You might notice that some of these rules prohibit things other online platforms allow. That’s because of our determination to keep Homesy as safe as possible. We ask that you respect our standards — and understand that violating them may result in enforcement action against your account. We’re always learning, so as our community evolves and our platform grows, these standards may change too. If you have any questions, please write to us at info@homesy.us.
Our Golden Rule: When you’re using Homesy, be kind.
If you see something that you think violates these Community Standards, please let us know: email us here. (For more information about the legal relationship between you and Homesy, head over to our Terms of Use.)
We appreciate your cooperation with these standards and commitment to making Homesy a safe and respectful space.
CIVILITY AND RESPECT
We expect all Homesys to treat one another with kindness. This means we expect you to be civil and respectful in all of your interactions to everyone on Homesy. To encourage this rule, Homesy prohibits:
Discrimination, Slurs, and Hate Speech
Homesy honors and welcomes users of all ages, backgrounds, and identities. You may not demean, threaten, or attack individuals or groups, or encourage others to do so directly or indirectly, on the basis of their:
Race, perceived race, or ethnicity
Color
National origin
Sexual orientation
Gender, gender identity, or gender expression
Religion or religious affiliation or beliefs
Age
Physical or mental disability
Veteran status
Familial status
Fair Housing Act Regulations
In addition to the above, Homesy upholds The Fair Housing Act, a U.S. federal law protecting people from discrimination whenever they are renting or buying a home, getting a mortgage, seeking housing assistance, or engaging in other housing-related activities.
It is illegal discrimination to take any of the following actions because of race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity and sexual orientation), disability, familial status, or national origin. Any violation of the following FHA rules will result in the immediate termination of your Homesy account and will be reported to the FHEO.
Refuse to rent or sell housing
Refuse to negotiate for housing
Otherwise make housing unavailable
Set different terms, conditions or privileges for sale or rental of a dwelling
Provide a person different housing services or facilities
Falsely deny that housing is available for inspection, sale or rental
Make, print or publish any notice, statement or advertisement with respect to the sale or rental of a dwelling that indicates any preference, limitation or discrimination
Impose different sales prices or rental charges for the sale or rental of a dwelling
Use different qualification criteria or applications, or sale or rental standards or procedures, such as income standards, application requirements, application fees, credit analyses, sale or rental approval procedures or other requirements
Evict a tenant or a tenant’s guest
Harass a person
Fail or delay performance of maintenance or repairs
Limit privileges, services or facilities of a dwelling
Discourage the purchase or rental of a dwelling
Assign a person to a particular building or neighborhood or section of a building or neighborhood
For profit, persuade, or try to persuade, homeowners to sell their homes by suggesting that people of a particular protected characteristic are about to move into the neighborhood (blockbusting)
Refuse to provide or discriminate in the terms or conditions of homeowners insurance because of the race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity and sexual orientation), disability, familial status, or national origin of the owner and/or occupants of a dwelling
Deny access to or membership in any multiple listing service or real estate brokers’ organization
The Fair Housing Act also makes it illegal to harass persons because of race, color, religion, sex (including gender identity and sexual orientation), disability, familial status, or national origin. Among other things, this forbids sexual harassment.
Dating and Romantic Content
Homesy is a safe space for chatting about real estate, collaborating on real estate, making friends in real estate, not a dating site. We prohibit content that seeks or portrays romantic relationships, including:
Animations of kissing, hand holding, or other romantic gestures in a romantic context
Experiences that depict romantic events, including weddings, dates, and honeymoons
Profanity
To keep Homesy safe and civil for everyone, we don’t allow swearing/cursing in text, images, or uploaded audio, including:Using misspellings, special characters, or other methods to evade detection of profanity
Profanity in different languages
Quoting or using songs with profane lyrics
Extortion and Blackmail
We do not allow users to extort or blackmail each other. Extortion refers to any attempt to threaten another user in order to force them to do something. This includes threats to:Reveal personal information
Take over another user’s account
Make false abuse reports
Harm someone in real life
Political Content
We value friendly debate about issues and topics that matter to Homesys. However, to maintain a civil and respectful environment, we prohibit the discussion or depiction of:Current candidates running for public office, including their slogans, campaign material, rallies, or events
Political parties, including official party-affiliated organization
Specific races for elected office
Sitting real-world elected officials
Previously-elected officials in their official capacity
Individuals who have previously run for political office in their capacity as candidates
Desecration of political entity symbols, including flag burning
Inflammatory content related to real world border, territorial, or jurisdictional relationships
Real-World Tragic Events
Homesy prohibits content that recreates specific real-world tragic events; mocks the victims of such events; supports, glorifies, or promotes the perpetrators; or capitalizes on these events for commercial purposes. Real world tragic events include:Mass shootings and domestic terrorism
Specific, real world, natural disaster events
Human or civil rights violations
Harmful Off-Platform Speech and Behavior
Homesys treat everyone with respect, both on and off of Homesy. If reported to us, we may disable the accounts of users who:Are associated with organized crime, terrorist organizations, or hate groups
Harass, bully, discriminate, or harm others outside of Homesy
Share others’ personal information off-platform, including making false reports to authorities
Abuse of Homesy Employees or Affiliates
Homesy expects its users to treat all Homesy employees, contractors, or affiliates with kindness and respect. Mistreating Homesy employees, contractors, or their families in any form, including via email, off-platform, or in-person could result in the loss of your account. This includes:Threatening physical harm to an employee or contractor
Threatening to share the employee or contractor’s personal information
Harassing Homesy employees or contractors online
Threatening damage or harm to Homesy offices or data storage facilities
02. FAIRNESS AND TRANSPARENCY
Homesy aims to build a community that’s transparent about its rules and how they’re enforced. We want Homesys to trust each other to play fairly and honestly, and to respect one another’s creativity and hard work. To help build such a community, Homesy requires its users to follow their local laws and does not allow:
Scams
We don’t permit deceptive schemes on our platform, including:
Sending or posting phishing or scamming links
Requesting passwords or access to another user’s account
Selling or seeking to buy accounts
Uploading unauthorized copies of content
Selling Homesy assets for real money off-platform
Artificially inflating the number of likes or visits to an experience
Spam
Homesy prohibits content that is designed to deceive others or that is shared repeatedly and disruptively anywhere on the platform. This includes:Clickbait-type advertisements
Repetitive, large-volume messaging
Creating experiences solely to direct users off Homesy
Cheating and Exploits
We don’t permit users to deploy or discuss any methods of cheating, including:Using exploits to gain an unfair advantage anywhere on the platform
Sharing exploits with others or encouraging others to cheat
Misleading Impersonation and Misrepresentation
Homesy encourages creativity, including in your avatar designs and username, but we don’t allow users to mislead others by impersonating other people’s real- or virtual-world identity or affiliations, including other users, Homesy employees, contractors, and affiliates, or public figures. This includes any attempts to impersonate in the following areas:Name or username
Position in a company
Digital representation
A post or comment
Falsely applying a Homesy Verified Badge to any account
This does not apply to satire, fan art, or tributes that are not misleading to other users.
Intellectual Property Violations
We don’t allow users to violate intellectual property rights on Homesy, and will remove infringing content upon receiving a valid Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) notice or Trademark infringement removal request. Examples of intellectual property infringement may include:Using another developer’s code to create your experience without their permission
Using another artist’s music in your experience
Using a brand’s logo or designs for the content you design without their permission
Directing Users Off-Platform
When using Homesy, you may not link to any external websites or services, except for: YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. Links to any of those approved sites must be listed in the Social Networks and Social Links settings of your profile or experience description page. Links that appear in locations where the API cannot be deployed - such as text chat - are prohibited. Any other links are prohibited, including:Links that contain Homesy-inappropriate content
Partial links, filter-breaking, and permitted website links to non-permitted websites
Encouraging others to visit unpermitted external links
Advertising
Homesy will determine, at its sole discretion, whether advertising or brand placement meets our requirements and may reject ads whose content harms our relationship with our community or compromises our competitive interests. If your ad violates these rules, we may remove the content or suspend your experience, or require you to remove the content, at any time and without notice.
You may not relinquish control of the ad serving logic in your experience, including by using third party ad servers.
Ads may not contain content intended for users under the age of 13.
Ads must comply with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (“COPPA”), Children’s Advertising Review Unit (“CARU”) and Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative (“CFBAI”) guidelines, and all other applicable local laws and regulations.
Ads cannot falsely represent the content being advertised to encourage user engagement.
Developers may only share aggregated user information with third party advertisers.
03: SECURITY AND PRIVACY
We want Homesys to feel safe digitally as well as physically. We can achieve this by respecting each other’s private information and Homesy’s safety systems, and keeping Homesy accounts and systems secure. This section describes how users should treat others’ information and digital security. For information about how Homesy handles your personal information, please visit our Privacy Policy.
To maintain a safe environment, Homesy does not permit:
Unauthorized Access
We prohibit any activity that is used to gain unauthorized access to Homesy’s systems or accounts, as well as threatening or encouraging such activity. This includes:Using VPNs to mask your location in order to gain unauthorized access to the Homesy platform, a specific feature, or another user’s account
Attempting to hack another user’s account
Launching any sort of cyberattack
Posting misleading links for the purpose of gaining unauthorized access (i.e., phishing)
Launching malicious software (i.e., malware) to cause damage to or gain access to another user’s computer.
Sharing Personal Information
We do not permit users to share their or others’ personal information on Homesy, including:
Full name
Email address
Passwords
Physical address
Telephone number
Unique Identifiers
Images of themselves or other private individuals
Unauthorized voice recordings of minors
Misusing Homesy Systems
Homesy maintains many systems to keep our users safe and secure, and we prohibit attempts to bypass these systems or otherwise violate our platform security requirements. This includes:Attempting to get prohibited content approved by our moderation team
Opening new accounts for the purpose of evading an enforcement action taken against a previous account
Using bots that are programmed to run disruptive, large-scale tasks
Re-uploading previously-moderated content
Failing to use required policy APIs in your experience
Falsely reporting other users or experiences, or encouraging or others to do so
Invading or flooding experiences or groups in an effort to destroy the experience or its reputation
04: SAFETY
We want Homesy to be safe and welcoming for everyone, regardless of identity or beliefs. To keep Homesy a place where everyone feels comfortable being themselves, the following is not allowed:
Child Endangerment
Homesy has a zero-tolerance policy for endangering children. This includes:Any predatory behavior, including attempting to befriend a child in order to manipulate and exploit them (i.e., grooming)
Sexualizing children in any way
Engaging in sexual conversation with or soliciting sexual material from minors
Sharing, requesting, or discussing child sexual exploitation imagery
Threats of Violence
Homesy does not permit users to threaten others with real world harm or to encourage such threats, or to incite violence against people or property, and we may communicate with law enforcement agencies regarding credible threats of harm. This includes threats of:Physical assault or violence
Sexual assault
Property damage
Bullying and Harassment
Homesy does not allow bullying, stalking, trolling, harassment, or intimidation on its platform. We also do not allow any content that depicts, glorifies, or promotes such behavior. This includes:Singling out a user or group for ridicule or abuse
Sexual harassment
Suicide and Self Harm
At Homesy, we take our users’ well-being very seriously. We’re here to help provide resources for those struggling with mental health, and we may communicate with law enforcement regarding credible threats of self-harm. We don’t allow content or behavior that depicts, glorifies, or encourages suicide or self-injury, including:Describing methods for suicide
Content that supports or depicts instances of self-harm
Sexual Content
Homesy does not allow sexual content or activity of any kind. This includes content that depicts, discusses, or suggests:Sexual acts
Nudity
Sexually suggestive avatar clothing items
Violent Content and Gore
Although some experiences on Homesy may include weapons and violence, we don’t allow content that contains extreme violence or serious physical or psychological abuse, including:Animal abuse and torture
Realistic depictions of extreme Gore
The depiction, support, or glorification of war crimes or human rights violations, including torture
Terrorism and Violent Extremism Content
Homesy prohibits content or behavior that supports, glorifies, or promotes any terrorist or extremist organization and their actions, including:Depictions of or support for terrorist or extremist attacks or terrorist actors
Depictions of or support for the leaders of terrorist organizations
Depictions of the slogans, images, flags, or icons of terrorist organizations
Recruiting membership for a terrorist or violent organization, or encouraging others to leave Homesy to find such information
Fundraising for terrorist or extremist organizations, people, or groups
Illegal and Regulated Goods
We prohibit users from discussing, depicting, or promoting illegal and some regulated goods. You also may not encourage others to violate laws in the real world, or do so yourself. These goods and activities include, but are not limited to:Illegal and regulated drugs, including marijuana and the misuse of prescription/over the counter drugs
Drug paraphernalia, including: pill bottles, pills, syringes, and pipes
Health and dietary supplements and enhancers such as weight loss pills and steroids
Depictions of intoxicated behavior associated with consuming alcohol or drugs (e.g., being drunk, high, strung out, or any other inebriated state)
Tobacco, including e-cigarettes, e-liquid, vapes, hookas, and other smokable products
Bomb/explosive and weapon-making instructions or schematics in the real world
Realistic modern firearms outside of in-game experiences
Real World Physically Dangerous Activities
Homesy does not allow the depiction, glorification, or encouragement of participation in activities in the real world that are specifically designed to create an extreme risk of physical harm to the participant offline. This includes:Physical challenge or stunt trends
Dangerous misuse of fireworks