Martha Stewart is making her mark on the world of AI in a way that feels entirely her own: she has joined the co-founding team of Hint, an app designed to use artificial intelligence for managing home maintenance and related tasks. Launching today, Hint helps homeowners handle maintenance schedules, energy management, soil and air quality insights, insurance claims, and more. It also serves as a repository for contracts, files, and invoices connected to the home, all searchable through a built-in AI assistant.

Co-founder and CTO Kyle Rush, based in New York, explains that Stewart, who lives nearby, is deeply involved with the startup without being a financial backer. "She's a real co-founder with a serious stake in equity, and she does work for the company and the app. She's not a figurehead. I go over about twice a week," Rush says. "We sit down and look at the app, and she looks at what it's saying - when it's wrong about soil, she'll say it, and when it's not right about something about the home…she'll mention it, and she'll comment on what I design and the branding and the language. And so she's, I would say, very involved."

The startup originally launched in 2024 as a tool focused on navigating home decarbonization incentives, but quickly pivoted to a broader mission. "We really quickly realized, why can't this be the AI for your home. People don't really have an app to manage their homes…so we just pivoted," Rush says. Hint joins a growing field of AI applications that move beyond chatbots to solve real-world problems, with Stewart's personal expertise refining the experience.

To get started with Hint, users enter their home address, and the app builds a profile using public data like property records, weather and soil information, utilities, and more. Users can then upload documents such as inspection reports, home warranties, mortgage documents, contracts, insurance policies, and invoices.

This data reveals details about the soil beneath the foundation and how it might affect lawn drainage or foundation movement. It also provides insights into air quality, climate risks like floods, home insurance rates, and energy usage.

Homeowners can upload photos of major appliances, allowing the app to guide them through maintenance tasks or answer "how to" questions. This feature often uncovers lesser-known upkeep tasks that many people overlook.

For example, you might know to change your refrigerator's water filter, but did you know that vacuuming the coils on some models can prevent fire hazards? Or when to flush a water heater or check the salt level for a home well? Hint's personalized maintenance schedule sends proactive push notifications, so you never have to remember these tasks. The schedule adapts as it learns about the house, its systems, and the surrounding environment.

This is where Stewart's decades of home management expertise come into play, guiding the app's development in key areas. Users can also add one-off tasks to their maintenance plans, such as replacing a damaged window screen or re-caulking baseboards. Hint provides an overall "home score," offering a quick snapshot of how well you're managing your home.

The in-app AI chatbot allows users to ask any question related to their home or uploaded documents. This includes simple queries like when the AC was last serviced, or more complex ones like the cost per kilowatt hour for electricity or whether a HELOC is a good idea. The app can also guide homeowners through insurance questions, such as whether deductibles are too high, if coverage is missing, or if filing a claim for a repair makes sense.

Before founding Hint, Rush led engineering at mattress startup Casper during its growth phase and served as CTO at online retailer Maisonette. He also built technology for the Obama and Hillary presidential campaigns. Co-founder and CEO Yih-Han Ma, based in Charlotte, N.C., was previously SVP and GM at Red Ventures, a digital media and technology company.

Rush says the idea for Hint emerged from his interest in applied AI and its practical uses for homeowners. Under the hood, Hint uses commercial libraries, primarily from OpenAI, along with Gemini for image processing. The AI intelligence remains free, with plans to introduce a premium subscription for power users managing additional properties. The app currently generates affiliate revenue from a partner network of service providers, which Rush says is kept separate from the AI to avoid bias in recommendations. Hint—whose name combines the "H" from "home" with "intelligence"—is backed by $10 million in funding from investors including Brian Kelly (The Points Guy), Slow Ventures, Tusk Venture Partners, Energy Impact Partners, Amplo VC, and Hannah Grey. The iOS app is free to download with no subscriptions or ads. "We want it to be in the hands of every homeowner in the country," Rush says.