Introducing the Geovo Dog-Livability Standard, Version 1.0

What we're publishing

Today we're releasing Version 1.0 of the Geovo Dog-Livability Standard — the residential verification framework behind every Geovo assessment. It's published in full, not summarized, because the entire premise of independent verification collapses if the criteria aren't public. An operator should be able to read this document and know in advance exactly why they'd pass or fail. A resident should be able to read it and know exactly what a Geovo mark actually asserts.

Why we built it this way

"Pet-friendly" is a permission label. It tells a prospective renter that dogs aren't prohibited. It doesn't tell them whether the daily experience works — whether the relief area is fifty feet from the door or five hundred, whether the fee schedule online matches what's in the lease, whether staff can answer the same question the same way twice.

The Standard exists to answer that second question, in terms specific enough to be measured, weighted, and — when a property doesn't meet them — failed.

How it's structured

Version 1.0 covers 35 criteria across six weighted dimensions:

• Policy & Access Clarity — can a resident know their obligations before they sign?
• Cost Transparency — can they calculate the real cost before they apply?
• Outdoor Access & Relief — the highest-weighted dimension, because it's the part of dog ownership that happens three to five times a day, in every season, including at 2 a.m.
• Daily Friction & Building Environment — the accumulated cost of elevators, lobbies, and corridors a resident navigates with a dog every day.
• Amenity Usefulness — not whether an amenity exists, but whether it works.
• Management, Staff & Resident Culture — whether the policy on paper is the policy the property actually operates by.

Layered on top are seven critical gates — pass/fail conditions that cannot be offset by a strong score elsewhere. A property with an excellent dog run and an undisclosed breed restriction isn't a good property with one flaw. It's a property that will surprise a resident after they've already signed a lease they can't easily reverse. That kind of deficiency doesn't average out. It fails.

The commitment that makes the mark mean something

The assessment fee we charge covers the audit and the written report. It does not purchase a tier, a badge, or a favorable finding. Properties that don't qualify pay the same fee and receive the same report as properties that do. Badge and public-profile rights are licensed separately, and only to properties that pass — a structural separation, not a courtesy, because a fee that automatically buys a badge isn't a certification. It's a sticker.

Every determination is dated and expires after twelve months. Where a criterion couldn't be fully assessed — fewer than five resident survey responses, an amenity unavailable at the time of the visit — that limitation is disclosed on the public profile rather than smoothed over.

What's next

Version 1.0 covers residential communities only. Our long-term thesis is broader — the same gap between claim and reality shows up in short-term rentals, hospitality, and other categories — but we're not building six standards at once. Each future module gets published only when it has its own category-specific criteria and has been properly reviewed, the same discipline applied here.

The full Standard, including every scoring anchor and gate, is available to read in full. If you operate a property and think we've gotten a weight or a criterion wrong, we want to hear it — this document is versioned for a reason, and it gets better with the next assessment, not the last one.