Write down how the house works

Every household runs on a set of facts that live in one person’s head. Which bin goes out on which week. How to make the boiler fire when it sulks. Where the stopcock is. The wifi password nobody can find. House notes is where those go.

1. More → House notes.
2. Add a note — give it a title and write the answer underneath.
3. Pin the ones people ask about most, so they sit at the top.

You can dictate instead of typing: tap the microphone and speak. It happens on your device, and it is the difference between writing the boiler note now and meaning to write it later.

Why this counts as sharing the load

This is the least visible kind of imbalance, and the most stubborn. If only one person knows how the heating timer works, that job cannot move to anybody else — not because of laziness, but because the knowledge is not shared. The Fairness Score can look respectable while one adult remains the only person who can actually run the house.

Writing it down is one of the few things that genuinely redistributes work rather than redistributing tasks.

What is worth writing down

The test is simple: if someone would have to ring you to find out, it belongs here.

• The boiler and heating — how to relight it, where the timer is, what the odd noise means
• Bins — which colour, which week, where they go back
• Wifi — the network name and password, so guests stop asking
• Meters and the stopcock — where they are, and how to read them
• Appliances — the washing machine cycle that actually works, the dishwasher’s trick
• Emergency contacts — the plumber you trust, the neighbour with a spare key
• The house’s quirks — the window that sticks, the door that needs lifting

House notes or task notes?

Two different things, and it is worth getting right:

• House notes are about the house — facts that are true regardless of who is doing what.
• Task notes are about one job — how to do this chore, attached to the chore itself, so whoever picks it up finds the instructions where the work is.

If a note only makes sense next to a particular job, put it on the job.

Who can see them

Every adult in your household. They are not private notes — the point is that somebody else can read them when you are not there.

When it earns its keep

You will not appreciate this screen on the day you write it. You will appreciate it the week you are away and nobody rings to ask about the boiler, or the evening a grandparent is holding the fort and finds the bin day without a phone call.

Related

Task notes for how-to instructions on a single chore. Family documents for passports, insurance and anything with an expiry date — paperwork rather than know-how.