The latest trend in home security is adding smart home technology. At times, new trends like this seem to be a fad. If you wait long enough is usually passes, and the next new thing comes on the market. However, the smart home integrations are not only proving to be useful, they are even a growing market. It looks like it is here to stay. Should you join the crowd? Is it worth the cost?
What Can a Smart Home Do?
When Alexa, the virtual voice assistant, was released in 2014, we thought it was amazing. It could play music or make a phone call whenever we requested it. Now, six years later, our voice assistant can virtually control our home. Whether it’s vacuuming, cooking, closing our blinds, or turning on the lights, if it plugs in or connects to Wi-Fi, our virtual assistants can do it for us. This control includes our home security systems. All it takes is an integration of your smart devices into the home security hub. So, the question that everyone has is, is it worth the investment?
Money Saver?
The best part about smart home devices is that they are a la carte. You can choose which items will be helpful in your home. Pick out the ones that will save you time and money. The two that stand out the most when it comes to saving money are the smart thermostat and smart lighting. Let’s see what they can do.
- Smart Thermostat: General opinion is that it can save you about 15 percent in residential cooling costs and about 10 percent in heating. By being integrated with your home security system, your thermostat can see when you come home and leave, when everyone sleeps, and so on. It learns when to adjust itself for your comfort. In addition, you have the app on your phone to make any adjustments to the temperature while you are away from the house. All in all, it saves money by not wasting energy on an empty house.
- Smart Lighting: The smart lightbulbs are LED and are about 90% more efficient than your regular bulbs. USA Today said that LED bulbs alone could save you up to $1,000 over a 10-year span. Add it to the factor of a smart bulb, and it could be more. It may not look like a lot monthly, but it all adds up. Smart bulbs can be controlled by your virtual voice assistant or an app on your phone. It can run on a schedule you have set or you can manually control your lights from the app if you are not home. Some of these smart bulbs can change from white to literally millions of colors and shades to fit the mood or party theme.
Should You Add to Your Home Security?
A couple of things to keep in mind, these are only two examples of smart home devices. There are so many more to choose from that may fit you better. Each individual has a different type of home and family routine. With a home security system, smart home devices will integrate right in there. You manage all of it on your security hub or app.
If you do not have a home security system yet, give us a call at Fort Knox Home Security to see what you can add to your home. In the meantime, your smart devices work through apps and virtual home assistants. The future is definitely set for smart homes to become normal. Don’t get left behind! Ease yourself into the market and you may be surprised at how convenient these items come to be for you.
