Privacy Policy

We collect information you provide directly, including:

• Account details: name, email address, phone number, county, and role (viewer, landlord, agent);
• Profile details for landlords/agents: agency name, bio, years of experience, license number, website;
• Whether your phone number is reachable on WhatsApp, and — separately — a phone number you have verified for M-Pesa purposes;
• Property listing details, including photos and a location you search for or pin on the map;
• Messages you send through the enquiry form or internal chat, and enquiries you submit as a guest;
• Anything else you choose to submit, such as support requests sent to our contact email.

We also collect some information automatically, such as basic usage data (e.g. property view counts) needed to operate the marketplace.

• To create and secure your account, and generate your unique Customer Reference ID;
• To display your listings and profile to other users;
• To connect you with other users through calls, WhatsApp, enquiries and internal chat;
• To route your M-Pesa Paybill Account Number once your phone number is verified;
• To review and moderate property submissions;
• To send you account-related notifications (e.g. review decisions, messages);
• To maintain an internal audit log of sensitive account actions (e.g. suspensions, admin changes) for security and accountability.

We do not sell your personal information to third parties, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

If you list a property, you may search for its location or place a marker on a map powered by OpenStreetMap. Location search queries you type are sent to the OpenStreetMap Nominatim service (via our own server, not directly from your browser) solely to look up matching places; the coordinates you select are stored against your listing and shown publicly on that listing's page once it is approved. We do not track your own real-time device location — only the property location you deliberately choose to save.

Mahaba Homes uses cookies set by our authentication provider, Clerk, to keep you signed in and to protect your account. These are functional/security cookies, not advertising or cross-site tracking cookies. If we introduce analytics or marketing cookies in future, this policy will be updated to describe them and, where required, we will ask for your consent first.

We share the minimum data necessary with the following providers so they can perform services on our behalf:

• Clerk — authentication (manages your sign-in credentials; we never see your password);
• Cloudinary — stores and serves the property photos you upload;
• OpenStreetMap / Nominatim — powers map display and location search, using only the search text you type, not your account identity;
• A database/hosting provider that stores your account, listing and message records securely.

Each provider processes data under its own privacy terms; we choose providers that are reputable and appropriate for a platform handling personal and property data.

We keep your data for as long as your account is active. If you delete your account, we anonymize your personal information (name, contact details, avatar) rather than deleting your row outright, and archive (unpublish) any active listings — this protects the integrity of other users' enquiries, favourites and historical records that reference your account, while removing your identifying information from view. Audit log entries that reference your account for accountability purposes may be retained in de-identified form.

You may access, correct, or request deletion of your personal data at any time — most account fields can be edited directly in your profile settings, and full account deletion is available from the same page. For anything you can't change yourself, or if you have questions about your data, contact us at info@mahabahomes.com.

We rely on our infrastructure providers' security practices (encrypted connections, access controls) and apply our own safeguards in the platform, such as verifying sensitive actions server-side rather than trusting the browser, and logging significant account changes. No system is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security of information transmitted to or stored by Mahaba Homes.

Mahaba Homes is intended for users who are able to lawfully enter into rental or sale agreements in Kenya and is not directed at children.

We may update this Privacy Policy as Mahaba Homes grows. Material changes will be reflected by updating this page. Continuing to use the platform after changes take effect means you accept the updated policy.

For any privacy question or request, contact us at info@mahabahomes.com.