Roost Privacy Policy

Last updated: November 2026

Overview

Roost: Homestead Tracking is built by Derek Lund (Less Than Latte). Roost is designed to keep your homestead records on your device and in your own iCloud account. The only information that ever reaches our server is anonymous price data, and only if you choose to share it.

Data Collection

• All homestead data (animals, gardens, finances, tasks) is stored on your device.
• iCloud sync and household sharing use your personal Apple iCloud account. We never see or access that data.
• No analytics, advertising SDKs, tracking, or telemetry.
• We do not sell data, and Roost has no user accounts — we have no way to identify you.

Community Prices (optional)

Community Prices is off unless you turn it on (in setup or in Settings > Notifications). When it is on:

• What is sent: for each purchase line you save — the item description, the store chain, the price, the purchase date, and the first three digits of your ZIP code.
• What is never sent: your name, Apple ID, email, device identifier, full ZIP code, exact location, receipt photos, or any animal, garden, or financial records.
• Where it goes: our server at roost-api.lessthanlatte.com, where it is combined with other contributions to compute regional median prices. Looking up a community price sends the item name and the same 3-digit region.
• Like any web server, ours sees the IP address of each request. We do not store IP addresses with price data or use them to identify anyone.
• Because contributions carry no identifier, we cannot link them back to you — which also means we cannot find and delete an individual contribution after it is sent. Turn the setting off at any time to stop sharing.

Third-Party Services

Roost connects to these external services only when you explicitly use the related feature:

• Open-Meteo (weather): Your latitude/longitude is sent to api.open-meteo.com to fetch current weather for the banner display. Open-Meteo is free, open-source, and does not require authentication. Their privacy policy: open-meteo.com/en/terms.
• xAI / Grok API (AI features, Premium): If you configure a Grok API key and use AI receipt scanning or plant lookup, image data or text is sent to api.x.ai for processing. This requires Premium subscription. Your API key is stored in the iOS Keychain.
• Home Assistant: If you configure a Home Assistant connection, Roost communicates with YOUR Home Assistant server at the URL you provide. No data is sent to any third party — it's your server.
• Apple HomeKit: If you enable HomeKit, Roost uses Apple's HomeKit framework to discover and control devices on your local network. This is handled entirely by Apple's frameworks.
• Apple StoreKit: Subscription purchases are processed through Apple's App Store. Apple handles all payment information — we never see your payment details.
• Tractor Supply availability: ZIP code is used to check product availability. No account or personal information is required.
• Store links: "Where to buy" links open the retailer's website in your browser. Some links may be affiliate links, which means we may earn a commission if you buy something. The retailer's own privacy policy applies once you leave the app.

Data Storage

• All data is stored on-device using SwiftData (backed by SQLite).
• iCloud sync uses Apple's CloudKit infrastructure with your Apple ID.
• API keys (Grok, Home Assistant) are stored in the iOS Keychain, Apple's encrypted credential storage.
• The only data on our server is the anonymous community price data described above.

Notifications

Reminders (tasks, hive inspections, hatching, watering, frost and price alerts) are scheduled on your device. Roost also receives silent background notifications from Apple iCloud so your devices and household members stay in sync; these come from Apple, not from us, and contain no content we can read.

Photos & Camera

The camera and photo library are used for receipt scanning and for photos you attach to your own records. Receipts are read on-device (Apple Vision) or sent to the configured AI provider if you choose AI scanning. The microphone and speech recognition are used only while you are voice logging; speech is processed by Apple's speech recognition service.

Children's Privacy

Roost is not directed at children under 13. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

Your Choices

• Delete: Delete any record in the app, or uninstall Roost to remove all local data. To remove synced data, use iOS Settings > [your name] > iCloud > Manage Account Storage > Roost.
• Export: Settings > Export Reports produces copies of your records.
• Control: Community Prices, Home Assistant, HomeKit, and AI features are all optional. Leave them off and nothing leaves your device except weather lookups and iCloud sync.

Changes

We may update this policy as features are added. The current version is always available in the app and at lessthanlatte.com/roost/privacy.

Contact

Questions? Contact Derek Lund through the contact on lessthanlatte.com