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6/10

LocalRule

Paste any address worldwide and instantly see which rules apply at each administrative layer — county, city, district, neighborhood — from building permits to recycling day to alcohol sales hours, explained in plain English.

Target user

Homeowners, renters, and small business owners who need to know what local rules apply where they live or operate

Features
  • Layered rulebook lookup: see city, county, and district rules stacked for one address
  • Plain-English Q&A: ask 'Can I put a shed here?' or 'When is glass recycling?' and get a sourced yes/no
  • Rule-change alerts for your saved addresses when zoning or licensing changes
  • Side-by-side neighborhood compare for house hunters and relocators
Why now

OpenStreetMap now has standardized admin_level tags for nearly every country, making cross-border, multi-layer jurisdiction lookup feasible for the first time — just as remote work has made people care about rules at non-home addresses.

Signals · overall 6/10
Demand
5/10

OSM admin_level trending on HN with 60 points reflects active interest in geographic administrative data, and consumer demand for zoning/permit lookup is a known but underserved pain pointKey:admin_level - OpenStreetMap Wiki

Whitespace
7/10

Existing municipal code sites like Municode are clunky paywalled PDFs; no consumer-facing tool layers city/county/state rules over a single address lookupKey:admin_level - OpenStreetMap Wiki

Monetization
5/10

B2C freemium with premium alerts plus B2B subscriptions for SMBs needing compliance — willingness to pay for legal info is real but price-sensitiveKey:admin_level - OpenStreetMap Wiki

Longevity
9/10

Rules, addresses, and jurisdictions are permanent fixtures; this need outlasts every tech hype cycle

Feasibility
5/10

OSM data is free and structured, but pulling official municipal codes per address still requires scraping/local partnerships — solvable but nontrivial

OpenStreetMap: Admin_level for All Countries · 60 points · 9 commentsHacker News · 2026-07-23 (1d ago)