1 in 3
Cement that never becomes a wall
Materials bought and never delivered. Ghost workers on the payroll. Slabs cast before anyone qualified looked at the steel. A family's life savings vanish into a half-built shell in Gayaza.
Kampala · Uganda · East Africa
In East Africa, the hardest thing to buy is trust.
The fundi who disappears with the deposit. The cement that never reaches the site. The rent paid in cash with no record. TruHab is the operating system that replaces promises with proof — timestamped photos, GPS-stamped work and money held by a licensed bank until the job is truly done.
The problem
We don't have a labour problem. We have an evidence problem.
The plumbers, masons and engineers of this region are skilled. What is missing is the layer that records what happened, who did it, and where the money went.
Cash only
Rent with no paper trail
Deposits paid by mobile money to a personal number. No lease, no receipt, no record of the cracked window that was already there on move-in day. When the dispute comes, it is one word against another.
No recourse
The fundi who never comes back
You pay upfront because that is how it is done. The leak returns in two weeks. The number goes dead. There is no rating, no history, nobody to hold accountable.
Daily
A household run on memory
Kadogo shopping, school fees, the maid's advance, Yaka tokens, the shamba boy's NSSF. All of it tracked in someone's head, or in a notebook that gets lost.
The people behind the work
Every fundi has a face, a record and something to lose.
NIRA-verified identity. A ten-second video introduction. Vouches from neighbours who already hired them. A Reliability Score that drops the moment a job is abandoned.
Ssemakula D.
Electrician · Ntinda
214 jobs · photo-proofed
Okello J.
Plumber · Kireka
178 jobs · photo-proofed
Mugisha P.
Painter · Kyanja
96 jobs · photo-proofed
Wasswa T.
Mason · Gayaza
143 jobs · photo-proofed
Kirya B.
AC Technician · Bugolobi
87 jobs · photo-proofed
Ainebyona R.
Site Foreman · Wakiso
61 jobs · photo-proofed
Eng. Nsubuga M.
Verified Engineer · Kampala
39 jobs · photo-proofed
The solution
A chain of evidence, from the first photo to the last shilling.
- 01
Book, and the money leaves nobody's pocket
The agreed price is locked into an escrow account held by a licensed bank — Stanbic, Centenary or DFCU. TruHab never touches your shillings.
- 02
The work is photographed as it happens
Before, during, after. Every photo carries a GPS location and a timestamp that cannot be edited after the fact.
- 03
You confirm with your own photo
Not a star rating from memory — an image of the finished work. On a site, a verified engineer must upload a ten-second video before the milestone unlocks.
- 04
Only then does the money move
The bank releases the balance, commission is deducted, and 5% retention is held through the defect period so the fundi has a reason to come back.
Three realities, one system
The home you live in. The rooms you rent. The house you are still building.
Pillar one
Resident Command
Twenty service categories, from plumbing to salon to generator repair, booked with the price locked in escrow. Kadogo-sized market shopping logged straight into your accounts. Maid and shamba boy records with NSSF and salary advances. A Morning Glance screen with the load-shedding schedule, Yaka balance and rent due dates.
- 30-minute SLA — a replacement pro is dispatched automatically
- Receipt photos read by OCR into your household ledger
- Chamas that pay directly into a verified household goal
Pillar two
Portfolio Health
WhatsApp-group chaos becomes a structured tenancy. Landlords see every unit colour-coded by rent status, issue notices compliant with the Landlord and Tenant Act 2022, and export a URA tax report in one tap. Tenants get a NIRA-signed lease and a portable Tenant Passport built from real payment history.
- Timestamped move-in gallery ends the deposit argument
- Umeme and NWSC reconciliation with 30% spike leak alerts
- Daily and weekly micro-installments for rent
Pillar three
Structural Genesis
Five phases, twenty-plus stages, each with planned cost, actual cost and photo evidence. Slab, ring beam and roofing stay locked until a verified engineer signs off on video. Diaspora funders receive a monthly progress recap they can watch on WhatsApp.
- Empty cement bags counted by computer vision before clearance
- Price-Lock Oracle flags over-invoicing on materials
- GPS check-in photos end ghost-worker payroll fraud
The fourth reality
Health services, held to the same standard of proof.
When someone in the house falls sick, the questions are the same ones TruHab already answers: who is qualified, what does it really cost, and does my money move before or after the service is delivered? Health is woven into the resident experience — and strong enough to stand on its own.
Symptom checker
A short questionnaire suggests likely causes and the medicines that treat them, priced in shillings — and flags red-flag combinations that mean go to hospital now, not tomorrow.
Pharmacy delivery
Verified pharmacies list generic name, strength, price and whether a prescription is needed. Your money sits in escrow until the pharmacy uploads delivery confirmation. 2% commission.
Hospital ranking
Every hospital scored 0–100 from Ministry of Health grades, patient ratings, equipment availability and waiting times. Filter by distance, quality or speciality.
Doctor booking
NIRA-verified doctors browsable by qualification, language, fee and rating. The fee locks in escrow, you get a QR ticket, and funds release once you confirm — after notes and prescription are uploaded.
Ambulance SOS
One button shows the nearest registered ambulances. Dispatch locks an estimated fee in escrow with live GPS tracking, released only when the hospital confirms drop-off.
One app, infinite personal realities
Every person sees a different TruHab — shaped by the asset in front of them.
One identity, one login. Tap the asset switcher at the top and the entire dashboard, toolset and navigation reshape instantly — with a NIRA-verified badge and a permanent “Bank Escrowed” indicator always in view.
Household
Your own home or family residence
Kansanga Heights · KAM-04B
Rental Unit
A property you rent out, or the unit you live in
Ntinda Unit 2 · NTD-12
Construction Site
An active build, from groundbreaking to handover
Mukono Site · MUK-SITE
Estate / Block
A parent record over many units, splitting shared costs
Security · garbage · common power
Role-based permissions
If a person does not have permission, the button does not exist for them. No warnings, no accidents, no arguments.
- Owner
- Full control — every action available
- Spouse
- Same as owner, but no deletions and no approvals above UGX 500,000
- Staff (maid, shamba boy)
- Log expenses and request groceries — never the wallet
- Tenant
- Pay rent, raise maintenance, view the lease
- Landlord
- Tenant ledger, maintenance approval, legal notices
- Professional
- Accept jobs, upload evidence, receive payouts
- Site Manager
- Site diary, material requests, stage completion — no wallet
- Engineer
- Approve critical stages with video evidence
- Family Elder
- View-only, with the standing to arbitrate a dispute
- Diaspora Funder
- Fund escrow from abroad — cannot approve withdrawals
A week with TruHab
This is what it feels like when the house runs on proof.
Not dashboards for their own sake. Ordinary moments in an ordinary week — each one with the argument taken out of it.
The Yaka is low, rent falls due on Friday, and the maid's pay is logged. One screen, before anyone argues.
Posho, oil, charcoal — ordered at a price you can check, delivered to the gate, paid only on arrival.
The leak is fixed and photographed. GPS, timestamp, and your own confirmation photo before money moves.
The slab is poured in Gayaza. The funder in Dubai watches the milestone unlock, not a promise on WhatsApp.
Every unit colour-coded by rent status. Notices, receipts and arrears in one place.
Real prices from the market you actually buy in — not a number invented in an office.
The evidence chain
Six links between a promise and a payment.
Link 1
Capture
Every photo carries GPS coordinates, a device timestamp and the identity of the person who took it.
Link 2
Seal
The image is hashed and stored so any later edit is detectable. Evidence cannot be quietly replaced.
Link 3
Attach
It binds to the job, the stage or the tenancy it belongs to — never floating in a WhatsApp group.
Link 4
Witness
An LC1 official, an engineer, a family elder or a chama can digitally co-sign the set.
Link 5
Release
Only a complete, confirmed evidence set moves money out of the bank escrow account.
Link 6
Archive
Everything is exportable — a property dossier for a bank, a court, a buyer or URA.
Built for here, not ported from elsewhere.
Offline-first
Capture evidence with no network. It queues on the device and syncs the moment a bar appears — built for sites where data dies.
Luganda & Swahili voice
Full voice control, not a half-translated menu. Speak the request, hear the confirmation.
Low-end Android
Runs on the phones people actually own, with data-light image handling.
WhatsApp everywhere
Any receipt, notice, ledger or progress recap shared in one tap, because that is where families already talk.
MTN, Airtel & Flutterwave
Mobile money first, cards second. No one is forced into a bank app.
Community vouching
Your neighbourhood, your chama and your LC1 can stand behind you — real social capital, made portable.
The accountability layer
A reliability score that decides who gets the work.
Scored 0–100 on acceptance, completion, on-time arrival, disputes, ratings and verification level — the same philosophy that changed boda riding, applied to fundis, site managers and contractors. Strike points reset every 90 days; the serious violations do not wait for a total.
Score bands
- 90–100Top Pro
Priority dispatch, visible badge, escrow released in 2 hours, premium jobs
- 70–89Active
Normal dispatch, standard 24-hour escrow release
- 50–69Warning
Lower priority, fewer leads, mandatory training reminder
- 30–49Restricted
Low-value tasks only, weekly performance review
- 0–29Suspended
No new jobs, payouts frozen, reactivation by formal appeal
The strike system
- +1Cancel within 30 minutes of start
Warning
- +2Cancel after start time
Lower dispatch priority for 7 days
- +3No-show without valid reason
3-day suspension, UGX 10,000 stake forfeited
- +5Cash payment outside escrow
Account frozen, NIRA re-verification
- +10Fraudulent materials
Permanent deactivation, reported to trade body
- +10Abandoning a construction site
Payments frozen, blacklisted, legal escalation
Fair geography
Declining needs a reason. Varied, honest reasons cost nothing — a pattern of refusing one neighbourhood does.
Disputes & appeals
A dispute freezes the escrow and sends a TruHab Inspector. Appeal within 48 hours; serious cases go to the Trust Council, whose decision binds.
Reward, not only punishment
Top Pros get a badge, priority dispatch, premium jobs, 2-hour payouts and — once micro-insurance lands — cheaper premiums.
The Promise Escrow
Uganda runs on promises, not bank balances. So we made the bank enforce the promise.
Construction rarely waits for the full amount to be on hand. It waits for an approved loan, a relative abroad, a tenant about to move in, land already sold. The client says start; the contractor — burned before — hesitates; the site stalls. All the risk sits with the person doing the work. A Promise Escrow moves that risk onto a bank-verified account link.
- 01
Client declares the funding source
Not a vague promise — a named account. The salary account at Stanbic, the Centenary account a loan will be disbursed into, the account a relative abroad sends to, or where sale proceeds will land.
- 02
The bank verifies it
TruHab submits a verification request. The bank confirms the account belongs to the client, that the incoming funds are traceable, and the expected amount and timing.
- 03
A sweep mandate is registered
When the money lands, the bank moves the owed amount to the escrow account first — before the client can touch the rest. The same check-off mechanic SACCOs already use.
- 04
The contractor sees Bank-Verified
Before lifting a single block, the fundi sees the assurance level — never the client's account details.
- 05
The sweep fires automatically
Salary, loan tranche, remittance or sale proceeds arrive; the transfer executes with no reminder, no chasing, no phone call.
- 06
TruHab releases on milestones
Paid out against engineer sign-offs, photo evidence and GPS attendance, exactly like ordinary construction escrow.
Tier A — Bank-verified
The bank confirmed the account and the mandate is live.
A full phase of work may begin — the whole foundation.
Tier B — Pending verification
Funds declared, paperwork not yet confirmed by the bank.
Small sub-milestones only, each needing fresh evidence.
Tier C — Social promise
A Promise Score plus LC1 co-signing or chama vouching, no bank link.
Only cheap, reversible work — clearance, surveying.
If the money never arrives
- 1. Flag — the escrow is flagged and a TruHab Inspector notified the moment the deadline passes.
- 2. Bank escalation — TruHab talks to the bank, not just the client, and allows a 14-day window for updated evidence.
- 3. Guarantee Fund — up to 50% of the value of verified completed work is paid out to the contractor.
- 4. Recorded debt — the Promise Score drops visibly and the balance follows the client's identity across the platform.
- 5. Social escalation — LC1 co-signers and chama backers are notified.
Worked example — Mukono
A developer holds land in Mukono and a UGX 50 million Centenary loan approved in three tranches — but no cash today. He opens a Promise Escrow, declares the disbursement account and submits the approval letter. Centenary confirms it and registers the sweep. Status moves to Tier A, and the contractor agrees to the full foundation phase. When tranche one is released, the sweep executes: the contractor is paid, the supplier is paid, wages are distributed against GPS attendance, 5% is retained — and a combined engineer, materials and attendance report goes back to Centenary to unlock tranche two.
At no point did anyone have to rely on the developer's word alone.
Also: the duka consignment product
The same mechanic describes the classic shop-and-supplier consignment. A supplier lists stock for a duka; the duka links its mobile money till as the verified source; as receipts accumulate through the day, an agreed percentage sweeps automatically to clear the debt. Lower risk than construction, and a proving ground for the whole model.
The financial trust layer
TruHab never holds your money.
The honest hesitation about any platform in this region is simple: where does my money actually sit? The answer is a regulated bank, in an account TruHab cannot draw from — released only when the evidence says the work is done.
- Stanbic · Centenary · DFCU
- Your money sits in a bank-held escrow account, never with TruHab.
- 5% retention
- Held back from every construction milestone until the defect period ends.
- Reliability Score
- A public strike system. Abandon a job and the whole market sees it.
- LC1 co-signing
- A local council official can digitally witness an evidence set.
Built for here, not ported from elsewhere
- Full voice control in Luganda and Swahili
- Offline-first — capture evidence with no network, it syncs later
- MTN and Airtel Mobile Money, plus Flutterwave
- One-tap WhatsApp sharing of any receipt, notice or report
- Community vouching from your own neighbourhood
- Seasonal prompts tuned to Uganda's calendar and rains
Who it is for
Whichever side of the deal you are on, proof works in your favour.
For families & residents
Stop guessing who to call.
- Twenty service categories with the price locked before work starts
- A 30-minute SLA — a replacement pro is dispatched automatically
- Household ledger built from photographed receipts, read by OCR
- Morning Glance: load-shedding, Yaka balance, rent due, staff pay
For landlords & tenants
End the deposit argument before it starts.
- Every unit colour-coded by rent status, arrears visible at a glance
- Notices compliant with the Landlord and Tenant Act 2022
- A URA-ready tax report exported in one tap
- A portable Tenant Passport built from real payment history
For builders & diaspora funders
See the slab before you pay for it.
- Five phases, twenty-plus stages, each with planned vs actual cost
- Critical stages locked until a verified engineer signs off on video
- GPS check-in photos end ghost-worker payroll fraud
- A monthly progress recap you can watch from Dubai on WhatsApp
For fundis & contractors
Your work becomes a record nobody can deny.
- The money is already in escrow before you lift a tool
- A public reliability score that wins you the next job
- Split settlements, supplier credit and faster payouts as you rank up
- Promise Escrow so you can start work without carrying the whole risk
The rollout
Phase 1
Kampala
Home services, escrow, evidence capture and the verified fundi network.
Phase 2
Rentals & health
Portfolio Health for landlords and tenants, plus pharmacy, doctors and ambulance SOS.
Phase 3
Construction
Structural Genesis, Promise Escrow and diaspora funding rails.
Phase 4
East Africa
Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, Kigali — same trust engine, local rules.
Why it matters
When proof is cheap, honest work finally wins.
A good mason in Wakiso should not lose work to a cheaper stranger with no record. A tenant in Kireka should not lose a deposit because nobody photographed the wall. A family funding a house from Dubai should not have to fly home to see whether the slab was cast. TruHab makes the honest version of every deal the easiest one to do.
Kampala, Uganda · we answer in English, Luganda and Swahili.