September 14, 2026 · 6 min read · By Andrew, creator of ChoreGenius

Why I Built a Chores App for My Family

Like a lot of parents, my wife and I wanted our kids to help out more around the house.

And like a lot of parents, we tried chore charts.

They didn't work.

We'd make a list of chores, put it somewhere everyone could see it, and try to get the kids into a routine. Before long, the chart became something they ignored and we became the people constantly reminding them about it.

"Did you do your chores?"

"Don't forget the playroom."

"Can you please feed the dog?"

It felt like a constant battle. The problem wasn't that our kids were incapable of helping. They just weren't particularly motivated to do it.

At the same time, another familiar conversation was happening whenever we went shopping.

"Dad, can I get this?"

Sometimes it was a toy. Sometimes it was something at Target. Whatever it was, the pattern was basically the same: they wanted something, and I was the guy deciding whether they could have it.

Eventually, it occurred to me that these were actually two sides of the same problem.

What Agile Product Management Has to Do With Chores

Earlier in my career, I worked as an agile product manager. In agile development, teams often assign points to work based on the relative effort involved. A small task might be worth a couple of points. Something much more difficult might be worth eight or ten.

One day I thought: Why not do the same thing with chores?

Instead of putting chores on a calendar and expecting the kids to do them because Tuesday happened to be "clean the playroom day," I assigned points to different jobs around the house.

Easy jobs were worth a little.

Feeding the dog? Maybe 1 point.

Cleaning up the family room? More points.

Tackling a playroom that looked like a tornado had just passed through it? That was going to be worth a lot more.

The harder the job, the more points you could earn.

Then I explained the deal to my kids: Do work around the house, earn points, save those points, and cash them in when you want something.

Suddenly, chores weren't just something Mom and Dad were nagging them to do.

They were an opportunity.

And It Worked

The difference was almost immediate.

Instead of me constantly trying to persuade them to do chores, they had a reason to look for things they could do.

More importantly, they had control over it.

If you don't feel like doing chores today? Fine.

But that also means you aren't earning any points today.

If you wake up Saturday morning feeling ambitious and decide you're going to clean the playroom, help with laundry, and knock out a few other jobs?

Go make bank.

I liked that flexibility because that's a little closer to how the real world works. Effort and reward were connected, but my kids had some say in how much effort they wanted to put in and what they ultimately wanted to do with what they earned.

It Became About More Than Chores

What surprised me was how many other lessons came along with the system.

My kids started learning about saving. If they didn't have enough points for something they wanted, they could keep working and save up for it.

They learned about effort and reward. Bigger jobs required more work, but they also paid more.

And they gained autonomy.

This might be my favorite part of the system.

Once one of my kids had earned enough points and wanted to spend them, I generally let her decide what to buy, within reason. After all, those were her points. She had done the work to earn them.

Instead of every trip to the store being a negotiation about whether Dad would buy something, the question became:

"Do I have enough points?"

And if the answer was yes, the decision increasingly belonged to them.

That's a small thing, but I think it's an important one. Kids don't get many opportunities to make genuine economic decisions for themselves. Suddenly they had to decide: Do I really want this? Is it worth spending what I've saved? Or would I rather keep my points for something I want more?

Not Everything Earns Points

There's an important distinction in our house, though.

We don't pay our kids for everything they're expected to do.

Cleaning your own room doesn't earn points. Neither do good grades.

Those are basic responsibilities. Taking care of your own space, doing your schoolwork, and doing your best are things we expect from our kids simply because they're part of growing up.

Points are primarily for doing work that contributes to the household.

There's a difference between taking responsibility for yourself and doing extra work that creates value for other people.

We wanted the system to reward the latter without teaching our kids that they deserve a prize every time they do something responsible.

From a Family System to ChoreGenius

For a long time, this was simply our family's system.

It solved a practical problem. My kids were more motivated to help. I was doing less nagging. And along the way, they were learning about work, saving, spending, and making their own choices.

Eventually I started thinking: I can't be the only parent dealing with this.

Chore charts aren't particularly motivating. Parents everywhere get asked, "Can I get this?" And most of us would love for our kids to develop a little more independence and take a little more ownership around the house.

That's why I built ChoreGenius.

It's a simple idea: parents create chores, assign points based on the effort involved, and kids earn those points by helping out. They can save them and eventually redeem them for rewards that matter to them.

The technology isn't really the point, though.

The point is to change the dynamic.

Less:

"I've asked you three times to clean the playroom."

And a little more:

"I really want that. How many points do I need to earn?"

That's the system that worked for our family.

And that's why I built ChoreGenius.