August 21st, 2024

Wardriving for a place to Live

Jampa Uchoa faces challenges finding a home in a small city with limited listings, proposing a tech-driven approach using AI and street mapping to evaluate neighborhoods and streamline the process.

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Jampa Uchoa describes the challenges of finding a home in a small, low-tech city with limited real estate resources. The author notes the absence of online listings and real estate agents, making traditional home searching difficult. To navigate this, Uchoa proposes a tech-driven approach, utilizing street mapping and AI to identify potential neighborhoods. The plan involves gathering street data, capturing Street View images, and using AI to evaluate neighborhood quality based on infrastructure and housing conditions. Uchoa encounters obstacles with existing mapping services and coding, leading to a DIY approach using OpenStreetMap and Playwright for image capture. The AI's evaluations reveal that while no areas received a perfect score, the ratings were consistent and reflected the neighborhoods' conditions. The author plans to visit the identified areas to further assess potential homes and considers using a 360-degree camera for more comprehensive street views. This innovative blend of technology and traditional methods aims to streamline the home-buying process in an uncharted market.

- Jampa Uchoa faces challenges in finding a home in a small city with limited real estate listings.

- The author proposes using technology, including AI and street mapping, to identify potential neighborhoods.

- Uchoa encounters difficulties with existing mapping services and resorts to a DIY approach.

- AI evaluations of neighborhoods show consistent ratings, with no areas receiving a perfect score.

- Future plans include visiting identified neighborhoods and potentially using a 360-degree camera for better assessments.

How I Use AI

The author shares experiences using AI as a solopreneur, focusing on coding, search, documentation, and writing. They mention tools like GPT-4, Opus 3, Devv.ai, Aider, Exa, and Claude for different tasks. Excited about AI's potential but wary of hype.

Your Driving App Is Leading You Astray

The article critiques popular driving apps for leading users astray and prioritizing speed over safety and user preferences. It suggests improvements like considering sudden lane changes and promoting OpenStreetMap for better navigation.

Google Maps is ruining us

The author recounts a Sicily trip where reliance on Google Maps led to a dangerous situation due to closed roads. They caution against blind tech dependence, urging a balanced approach for genuine experiences.

Ask HN: Am I using AI wrong for code?

The author is concerned about underutilizing AI tools for coding, primarily using Claude for brainstorming and small code snippets, while seeking recommendations for tools that enhance coding productivity and collaboration.

Home Insurance Decisions Based on Drones and AI

Travelers Insurance revoked a homeowner's policy due to an AI drone's false risk assessment of roof moss, highlighting transparency issues in AI decision-making and the need for updated consumer protection laws.

9 comments

By @joelkoen - 8 months

How is this related to wardriving?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardriving

By @metadat - 8 months

This city doesn't look like much work to drive. One evening of work to scope out every nook and cranny is infinitely better than what's possible for most American cities!

https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/c...

It is surprising the lengths some people will go to trying to code their way out of a problem rather than interact with the nearby and available human beings who already have the answers*.

* Yes, I too have been guilty of this in the past >..<

By @turtlebits - 8 months

Another data point is property tax records, some of which will list building "condition" on a scale of 1-10, or look at assessed property values over time.

By @johnea - 8 months

It is nice to see millennials re-discovering how pretty much everything was done before the explosion of the internet in the mid-90s.

Historically, what this article describes, was simply called "finding somewhere to live". There was no necessity to invoke warfare when looking for a house. One simply drove around the neighborhood looking for for-sale or for-rent signs.

Amazing that now just doing something in the real world is cause for excitement! But I'm sincerely happy to see a re-emergence of the practice.

BTW, I hope the author appreciates living in a place where "there are almost no real estate agents" along with the other described traits. Escaping the commodification of everything is more difficult every year, and you have to get pretty far from the epicenters to find it at all.

By @calmbonsai - 8 months

While a beautiful execution of an idea, he should've just taken a few days to drive around the neighborhoods and talk to people on the street and in the bars and restaurants.

There are still a few tasks where there is no substitute for ground-truth real-time cultural immersion.

By @alexchantavy - 8 months

This was fun to read. 8 years ago I used the google maps api to group apartments in Seattle that had fiber internet by neighborhood (http://blog.alexchantavy.com/articles/using-the-google-geoco... your blog is a much much more modern spin on house hunting. And yeah others are saying you could’ve just walked around and talked to people - and I’m sure you will - but this is still a useful way of showing how AI can be used to classify things for hackers in daily life.

By @bronco21016 - 8 months

Interesting idea. I think it becomes far more interesting if you can come up with analysis that not only provides homes for sale but homes that may be coming up for sale. Which neighborhoods have listings for furniture on Facebook Marketplace? Which homes appear to no longer have anyone living there. I look at a home I own that will be sold soon. No internet is setup there. Maybe you Wardrive, by the literal definition, and find homes that don't seem to have internet as an indicator that someone may be interested in moving/selling. The possibilities are endless.

By @aussieguy1234 - 8 months

The headline made me think someone was wardriving around looking for spaces with no wifi signal to find places to occupy/squat in (legally or illegally, depending on where in the world this would be), but it seems more like scanning street view for interesting places.

By @Havoc - 8 months

Very cool idea!

Wardriving for a place to Live