How Spotlert works
Spotlert does two related things: it helps your block share open street parking, and it helps your household keep track of the car you share. The two are kept deliberately separate.
Community parking availability
Shared with your block, inside a private group.
Start or join a group
A neighbor creates a private group for your block — for example "Maple St between 4th and 5th Ave" — and shares an invite code. Group admins approve every member.
Admins map the block
The group admin outlines the block so parking reports stay tied to the shared curb area.
Mark spots open or occupied
See a spot open up? One tap marks it available for the whole group; one tap marks it occupied again.
Neighbors get notified
Everyone in the group sees the open spot immediately, and the map stays current as spots are marked open or occupied.
Ask for a quick hold
Two minutes away? Ask the reporter to hold the spot. They can accept or decline — holding is always voluntary and never guaranteed.
Your household’s shared vehicle
Private to the people you share a car with.
Create a household
A household is the small circle of people who share a car. It is never searchable: members join with a code shared by an admin or a private invitation sent to their email.
Add your shared vehicle
Give the car a name everyone recognizes. Make, model, color, and plate are optional labels to tell one shared vehicle from another.
Save where you parked
Tap Park Here and confirm the pin. Add a descriptive address or a short note like "Level 3, near the elevator" if it helps. Both are optional.
Everyone can find it
Any household member can see where the car is and get directions to it — so nobody has to text "where did you leave it?" again.
Say when you take it
Tap I’m Taking It when you drive off. The saved location clears and the household knows who has the car.
Vehicle reminders
A household can also keep a short shared list of what the car needs — an oil change, an inspection, a registration renewal — due by date, by mileage, or whichever comes first. Anyone in the household can mark one done, and everyone sees that it was handled. Mileage is typed in by hand; Spotlert never reads your odometer. It is a shared checklist, not a maintenance record.
How the two stay separate
- Parking reports and vehicle locations never mix. A community parking report says a curb space looked open. Your household vehicle location says where your own car is parked. Neither appears in the other.
- Your parked car is not on any group map. Parking-group members cannot see your household’s vehicles, locations, notes, mileage, or reminders. Only current members of that household can.
- Household vehicles are not limited to a block. Group boundaries apply to community spot reports. You can save where you parked anywhere — another neighborhood, a garage, another city.
- Spotlert does not track your car or you. There is no background following of vehicles or people. A location is recorded only when someone deliberately taps Park Here, and it is cleared when someone takes the vehicle.