In todays times where technology has become a normal and accepted part of our lives, a logical progression is the adoption of using it for more and more purposes around our homes.
Reports online indicate that over 47% of US millennials do have a smart device for their homes, which sheds some light on how the smart home market is on the rise. The introduction of smart technology has really changed how we spend our lives around the house – and to some, makes it better and more productive.
In this article, we’ll be discussing some popular smart technology options that could prove beneficial in your resale if you have them in your home.
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Smart Thermostats
Smart thermostats let you control HVAC components like your air conditioning system and your heating system installed in your home using voice control or an app that is installed on your phone. The WiFi-based thermostats like the Nest by Google, makes it very convenient for you to keep your house at the temperature you want.
Smart thermostats can detect the ambient temperature of the room and adjust itself accordingly. Moreover, you can remotely control it to adjust to another room’s temperature as well. You can also start and stop your heating and cooling systems away from home. For instance, if you’re on your way home from a hard, tiring day out in the sun, you can switch on your AC remotely to have a cool room when you enter.
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Smart Home Security Kits
Smart security kits come with motion sensors, base stations, motion sensors, keypads, and open/close sensors as well as motion sensor camera systems. The devices come up with a customized variety of options that vary from glass break-ins to smoke detection. The technology in some instances requires service / monitoring packages from security companies that you have to pay for monthly.
Smart security kits often include cameras and doorbells connected to an app on your phone via the Internet.
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Smart Doorbells
Smart doorbells are usually the first thing people buy when they decide to go smart. The doorbells come with a built-in camera with a wide range of viewing angles. Additionally, the devices come up with a microphone and a speaker. It is hardwired in specific places and recognizes faces through its camera, and even announces them.
Smart doorbells are always recording; they ensure continuous surveillance of your door and can even recognize people you trust and let them come in even if you are not around. One thing to watch out for, some older models (and even newer) may only be compatible with Google Assistant, while others may come with Amazon’s Alexa or something else.
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Smart Locks
Similar to smart doorbells and with crossover functionality, who wouldn’t want to open the door while sitting on the couch? Here’s where smart locks come into play.
With these, you can remotely lock or unlock any door at your home. You can keep a check on the people coming in and going out and, at the same time, also grant digital keys to your guests.
An auto-lock and auto-unlock option increase its value. For instance, if you went to your office and forgot to lock your door, smart locks will automatically lock it within a specified time. Your worry of burglars entering the house with an open door is now gone!
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Smart CO monitoring
It happens more often then you know, people think their car is in the driveway outside and they remote start it to run and warm up before their commute and their home begins to fill your garage with a silent and deadly gas: Carbon monoxide (CO) Which even with your garage door open can still pose a threat to your health and safety. Hundreds of lives are claimed every year from this silent, colourless, and odourless gas that binds to your red blood cells and begins to starve your body of oxygen when as it passes into your lungs.
Smart monitoring CO monitoring systems alert home owners on the presence of this deadly gas and will contact police and fire departments as well placing them as one of the most essential new smart tools every health and safety conscious home owner should put on their list to purchase.These are some early symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning:
- Headache
- Vomiting
- Nausea
- Dizziness
- Tight lungs or shortness of breath
- Fatigue
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Smart Lighting
One of the more unique and rapidly progressing products in the smart technology sector, smart lighting allows home owners to do a variety of different things to light up their homes. With items like Phillips Hue WiFi bulbs or LED bars, home owners can utilize apps or services like Google home (with paired apps / smart lighting products) to control different lighting setups in various rooms of their homes, set timers so lights are always on at certain times, and to utilize the power of colour changing LED lights to set scenes and things like home studios, or behind the TV lighting solutions. For example, once setup a home owner getting ready of bed walking into their bedroom with a Google home mini could say "Hey Google, turn on bedroom light" one of the many commands that you can save time, but even better, instead of getting out of bed to turn that lamp light off, you can simply say "Hey Google, turn off the bedroom light" and get to sleep.
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Smart Garage Door Opener
Wireless garage door openers existed before the internet was popular, but smart garage door openers take things a step further. This newer technology allows for home owners to have capabilities ranging from monitoring the doors status (open / closed) from while you're away, or sharing access to your garage from anywhere within the world where you're connected online.
Smart garage doors and your smart phones not only can replace the remote control for your garage, but you'll also find other valuable options and features including reminders when the door has been left open, user management rules for opening / closing automatically and higher end models even offer the ability to watch your garage remote via connected video camera, two way audio, proximity sensors via GPS, LED lighting and connectivity with Google Home / Alexa or similar products.
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Smart Flood Sensors
Simply put, these small smart tools have one primary job, water detection! Notifying you of any standing water (flooding) issues when you're not home.
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Smart Plugs
These wonderful little tools can remotely (or through programming) automatically control and deploy (Appliances or Lamps ) and can be used Indoor or Outdoor.
Some examples, you have LED lights outside in your backyard, strung throughout. Once plugged into an outlet with a smart plug, you can simply program your plug to turn on at a specific time (when the sun sets) and your backyard lights will automatically turn on at that designated time. Or if you don't like or need the routine of having the lights in the backyard on but you run into a situation where your dogs are backing in the dark backyard, from your kitchen you can simply say "Hey Google, turn on backyard lights" while you continue to enjoy a glass of wine and make sure your dogs aren't getting into too much trouble.
These products just scratch the surface of the potential of smart technology for homes. Currently, the market is on such a rise that by 2025 the smart home market is expected to reach USD 174.24 billion.
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