Smart Tech
In today’s piece I want to talk about smart devices that can have an amazing impact on your home. Over the past 5 years we’ve seen an enormous uptake of smart devices being rolled out across the UK and much further afield, and for good reason. Helping you save those precious pennies and at the same time helping to reduce your environmental impact on the world, it’s easy to see why. Many of you will already be familiar with and may even have these devices installed – if you’re one of these forward thinking, cutting edge people, I salute you. If you’re yet to discover the benefits these gadgets, read on to find out how they WILL improve your life (and the desirability of your home to a buyer…)
Smart Phone enabled Thermostats – https://store.google.com/gb/category/connected_home?hl=en-GB&GoogleNest&utm_source=nest_redirect&utm_medium=google_oo&utm_campaign=GS102776&utm_term=control
The introduction of smart phone enable thermostats has revolutionised my life, and so could it yours. With the relevant technology installed on your boiler you’re now able to download a simple to use app that allows you to control your heating from wherever you are in the world, subject to an internet connection. Just got to bed and realised you’ve forgotten to turn the heating off? Nae bother, just head to the app and turn that off. Leaving work early and dreading getting home to an ice box? No more, you can now just open your phone and set your home to gently warm up for your arrival.
Video Doorbells – https://en-uk.ring.com/
Over the past 10 years or so, these have become the go to, new gadget to protect your home. No doubt you’ve been to a friend or family members house and seen the usually quite large doorbell with a camera on top, and possibly you’re wondering exactly what they do? Well, the devices connect to your internet connection within the house and will automatically send you a notification when someone gets within a certain distance (you can control this distance) – you then have the ability to activate the camera alongside a microphone to see who is at your door. Delivery on the way but no one’s in to get it? Speak to the delivery driver at your doorstep to make other arrangements! Concerned about suspicious activity on your street whilst you’re out at work? The security of your home is increased ten fold by the ability to see anyone that comes to your door and ask them, politely or not, to leave the premises.
Water consumption – https://www.waterpebble.com/
Did you know that, If a family of four can collectively reduce their showering time by three and a half minutes, they’d save £180 a year? Obviously, reducing the amount of water we use daily is a fantastic idea in our efforts to improve our environmental impact on the world, but it’s not always that easy. This fantastic invention has been designed to monitor and measure our water consumption and help you to save money through a traffic light system telling you when to turn off that tap! Although this device won’t increase your sell ability, it certainly does make you greener and more efficient.
Phillips Hue Smart Light Bulbs – https://www2.meethue.com/en-gb
Similarly to coming home to a cold house, coming home to a dark house, especially when you’ve just decided to become Hercules and carry all of the shopping in one go, can be extremely frustrating. Linked up with a voice activated smart speaker in your home, these light bulbs give you the ability that we all dreamed of as kids – using your voice to turn on and control the lighting within your home…and yes, you definitely will feel like you’ve been blessed with superpowers when you can illuminate your house without lifting a finger. Further to this, they can be set to an array of different colours that can help you achieve a desired mood within your home; perfect for setting the scene for your dinner party or family get together! Lastly, I cannot explain well enough how impressive these appear when showing round a perspective buyer!
Smart Fridges – https://www.bosch-home.co.uk/bosch-innovations/homeconnect/homeconnect-fridges
Smart fridges? ‘You’ve got to be kidding me’ I hear. No, I am not kidding you and these really exist. Smart fridges may externally appear like any other fridge you’ve seen but internally they’re smarter than most human beings – I mean no offence by this, and you’re almost certainly smarter than a fridge, but if, like me you’re constantly throwing away gone off food, this is the product for you. The fridge works simply by scanning the barcodes of all food that you store in it and checking the expiry details of this product using an internet connection. This information is then sent to your smart device, so you can see exactly what’s in your fridge without looking in your fridge enabling you to never let that broccoli go yellow again!
All of the above require an internet connection in order to work, which won’t be a problem for most, and the best way to command your colour changing lights is via a voice activated speaker such as Amazon’s Alexa or Google Home – the general consensus is that the Alexa unit will provide better response times and connectivity however, the Google home will give you a better sound quality. Personally, I use the google system and haven’t had any issues to date, but chose whichever is easiest for you!
So, to conclude, smart technology within the home can save you money, keep your home safer, make you more energy efficient and increase the demand on your property when you come to sell or rent. Whilst the initial cost of some of these items can be quite steep, if you look at them as an investment, you’ll certainly see a good return over time. The above is just a snippet of the available smart tech for your home and, if the past 5 years are anything to go by, when I return to this article it will probably make absolutely no sense and I’ll be introducing even more shiny new smart tech that’s available for your home…the modern world, hey?