Accessibility at Hously
Updated February 14, 2026 · We’re committed to making finding a home easier for every Canadian.
Our commitment
Hously is committed to providing an equitable experience to all users, including people with disabilities. Our public website, mobile applications, agent CRM, and customer-support workflows are designed and tested against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 Level AA. We also operate under Ontario’s Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) and align with the federal Accessible Canada Act where applicable.
Standards we follow
All Level A and AA success criteria; subset of AAA where reasonable.
Compliance statement filed annually with the Province.
Plan published annually; progress reports public.
axe-core runs in CI; quarterly manual audits.
Tested with
Every release is verified against:
- VoiceOver on macOS (Safari) and iOS (Safari)
- NVDA on Windows (Firefox & Chrome)
- JAWS on Windows (Chrome)
- TalkBack on Android (Chrome)
- Keyboard-only navigation (Tab / Shift+Tab / arrows)
- Operating-system high-contrast modes (Windows Forced Colours, macOS Increase Contrast)
- Browser zoom up to 400% without horizontal scroll loss
- Reduced-motion preferences via prefers-reduced-motion
Known issues
We don’t believe in pretending things are perfect. Current open issues:
Affects listings.html map. Workaround: focus state passes WCAG. Scheduled fix: Q1 2026 release.
Embedded third-party widget. We are working with Matterport on accessible alternatives.
We auto-generate fallback alt text with vision-AI. Agents are prompted to write descriptive alt during upload.
Roadmap
- 2026 Q2: Full audit by an external CNIB-affiliated auditor; public audit report.
- 2026 Q3: WCAG 2.2 AA conformance.
- 2026 Q4: Audio descriptions for all featured-listing video tours.
- 2027 H1: Sign-language video interpretation pilot for high-volume help articles.
Tell us when we miss
If you encounter an accessibility barrier, please tell us. We respond to every report within 5 business days, and we publish anonymized aggregate stats every quarter.
TTY users can reach us via VRS at the same number, or through Bell Relay Service 711.