Tenancy Rights Guided Assistant with Rules as Code for Punjab and Lagos Rental Laws
Tenants in Lahore and Lagos often do not know whether a rent increase, an eviction notice or a withheld deposit is lawful, and lawyers are expensive. Build a guided web assistant that asks a tenant a few plain questions and explains, with the exact provisions, what the local tenancy law says about their situation, using rules encoded from the statute and reviewed by a law teacher. It generates a short letter template the tenant can adapt.
Intermediate
A small team, or one strong student willing to learn something new.1 semester · 2 students
7 to ship
4 optional extrasSuggested stack
What you should ship
- A structured summary of the Punjab Rented Premises Act 2009 and the Lagos State Tenancy Law 2011 for five common situations, reviewed by a law teacher
- Rules as code for those situations, with each rule linked to its section
- A guided interview in plain English and Urdu or Yoruba or Pidgin, depending on the city
- Results pages that explain what the law says, quote the section and list next steps
- Letter templates generated from answers (for example, requesting a receipt or the deposit back)
- Unit tests for every rule and scenario tests written with law students
- A clear disclaimer and links to legal aid sources verified at the time of building
If you have time left
- A third jurisdiction, such as another province or Kenyan rental law
- A landlord mode with the same rules
- Saving a case summary as a PDF for a lawyer
- Analytics on which situations people ask about most, without storing personal data
The problem: rules that tenants never see
Millions of people rent homes in Lahore, Karachi, Lagos and Nairobi. Disputes over rent increases, deposits, repairs and eviction are common. Laws exist, such as the Punjab Rented Premises Act 2009 in Pakistan and the Lagos State Tenancy Law 2011 in Nigeria, but tenants rarely read statutes and often rely on what the landlord or the property dealer says. A short, accurate explanation of what the law says would help many people decide whether to negotiate, seek help or go to the rent authority.
What already exists and the gap
- Docassemble, an open-source platform, and A2J Author, from CALI and Chicago-Kent College of Law, power guided legal interviews in many countries.
- Legal aid organisations answer tenants' questions by phone or in person, with long queues.
- General AI chat tools answer legal questions but may mix up jurisdictions or invent provisions.
The gap is a reliable, jurisdiction-specific guide for tenants in South Asian and African cities, with rules written as code, tested and traceable to the law.
Inspiration
The OECD's work on "Rules as Code" encourages governments to publish rules in machine-readable form so that services apply them consistently. Guided interview tools built with Docassemble by legal aid groups show how to make law usable by non-lawyers. Your project combines both for tenancy law.
What you build
- Tenants answer a few questions and read what the law says about their case, with the section and suggested next steps.
- Legal aid workers use it to prepare clients before appointments.
- Law students use the rules and tests to learn how statutes apply to facts.
The technically interesting part
- Turning law into rules. Statutes have conditions, exceptions and undefined terms. Decide what the software can determine and what it must leave to a human, and mark that clearly.
- Traceability. Every outcome must link to the sections that produced it.
- Testing. Write scenario tests with law students before writing code, and keep them as the specification.
- Plain language. Explanations at a reading level most adults can follow, reviewed by someone who is not a lawyer.
How to evaluate it
- Rule accuracy: scenario tests reviewed by a law teacher, with any disagreements documented.
- Comprehension: test users read results and answer questions about their rights.
- Completion rate and time for the guided interview.
- Accessibility: a check on mobile and with a screen reader.
Suggested plan
- Weeks 1 to 3: read both laws with a law teacher and choose five situations.
- Weeks 4 to 6: scenario tests and rule design.
- Weeks 7 to 10: rules as code and the guided interview.
- Weeks 11 to 13: results pages, letters and translations.
- Weeks 14 to 15: user test, report and demo.
Path to a product
Legal aid NGOs, housing charities and city governments could host the tool, and the rules engine can extend to employment, consumer and family law. A team that builds trusted legal guidance tools has a clear niche in legal tech. The project shows careful modelling of complex rules.
Scope warning
This is legal information, not legal advice; say so on every page. Have a qualified law teacher review every rule. Do not store personal details of disputes. Laws change, so show the version date of the statute you used.
Learn what you need on Sefism
- Full-stack roadmap: the guided interview app.
- Software design roadmap: structuring rules for testing and change.
- QA and testing roadmap: scenario-based tests.
- Next.js documentation: building the app.
- Microsoft Writing Style Guide: writing plain explanations.
Get help with this idea
Legal rules are full of exceptions that are easy to miss. Tauseef can help you scope the situations and structure the rules so a law teacher can review them. If you are new here, create a free account first.
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