Affordable Housing Visibility: GovPolicy Hub

Affordable housing programs are constantly approved, yet people who could benefit from them often don't hear of them! Our goal is to combat this issue and make these programs accessible to everyone.

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Inspiration

There is a significant gap between government housing information and what users actually need. Government websites are often messy, outdated, and difficult to navigate. Even when using the search function, it is hard to find accurate and current information. At the same time, many commercial websites promote housing-related content but do not necessarily prioritize user benefit. We wanted to increase the discoverability of government-supported housing programs and make reliable information easier to access.

What It Does

Our platform provides the most updated and relevant government housing programs based on a user’s input information. Instead of forcing users to navigate complex and confusing government websites, our system aggregates housing program information from city sources, filters programs based on eligibility, and presents the results in a clean and easy-to-understand interface. To ensure transparency and accuracy, we provide direct links to the official government pages.

How We Built It

We built the project using cloud-based AI tools. We developed a web scraper to collect housing program data from government websites and structured a database to parse and store the information efficiently. We integrated AI to process, organize, and present relevant results based on user input. The front-end interface was designed to prioritize clarity and usability. The system is designed to automatically update information as government sources change.

Challenges We Ran Into

One major challenge was working with GitHub and coordinating development across multiple files. As a team with limited experience in collaborative version control, managing merges and organizing the project structure was initially difficult.

Another significant challenge was scraping government websites. Our original idea was that although these sites are difficult for humans to navigate, a computer could easily parse them. However, we discovered that inconsistent page structures, poor formatting, outdated information, and complex navigation made the scraping process far more complicated than expected. In many ways, the difficulty we encountered reinforced the importance of our project.

Accomplishments That We’re Proud Of

We are proud that we successfully increased the discoverability of government housing programs through a clean and polished interface. We built a system that can automatically update information, integrated AI throughout the workflow, and maintained transparency by linking directly to official government sources. Transforming fragmented and hard-to-access public data into an accessible, user-centered tool is an accomplishment we value highly.

What We Learned

Through this project, we learned how web scraping works in messy real-world environments, how to structure and manage databases effectively, and how to integrate AI into a functional system. We also gained practical experience using GitHub for team collaboration. Most importantly, we learned that real-world systems are often much more complex than expected, and building meaningful software requires adaptability, persistence, and thoughtful design.

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