In the future, every home could be a smart home. Indeed, at present, smart homes are becoming more and more popular.
But before you begin building a high-tech smart home, you should carefully consider the different technological elements you want to include. You can then approach your building project in the right way.
What are smart homes?
Before we look at five important considerations for a smart home, it’s worthwhile mentioning what a smart home actually is, as you may not know.
Well, basically, a smart home refers to a home setup in which all the appliances and devices can be automatically controlled remotely from anywhere, using a phone, tablet, laptop, or another networked device.
The appliances and devices in a smart home are interconnected via the internet to enable control functions like lighting, temperature, and security.
Things like thermostats, lights, TVs, door locks, security cameras, burglar alarms, and even refrigerators, can all be controlled via a smart home automation system.
1. Use Smart Lighting
You should carefully consider the smart lighting you plan to install before you begin building a smart home. With a smart lighting system, you gain control over the brightness and colour of your lighting in different rooms of your house.
Smart lighting can also be set up to include motion sensors. And you might want to consider using touch-sensitive switches. You can use an app on a device to control the lighting remotely according to your preferences.
2. Think About Smart Heating
Smart thermostats, switches, and motion sensors can be used to control the temperature and humidity of a home to ensure the heating is always at the level you want.
Items like smart thermostats and motion sensors can be connected to a central app so that the heating can be controlled from anywhere at any time.
Many smart thermostats use geofencing in order to turn the heating on or off, which means they use a person’s smartphone to detect when the individual leaves the house and returns home.
With smart heating, you can easily control the heating in different areas of your home. For instance, you can create different heat settings for upstairs and downstairs or for each room.
3. Consider Security
Smart home systems provide a wide variety of security alerts, from being alerted when your kids arrive home from school to detecting water leaks. You can even use smart locks to better control access to your home.
By determining your precise security needs, you can discern how to wire your house during the build. You’ll also want to consider things like where security cameras are positioned, for both practical and aesthetic reasons.
4. Strong Wi-Fi Signals Are Important Throughout the Building
In order for your home’s smart system to work well, you’ll need to ensure you have good Wi-Fi coverage. Thankfully, you can easily create custom Wi-Fi heat maps to determine how good your Wi-Fi signal is in different areas of your home.
And when looking at your Wi-Fi set-up, you should consider your home’s building materials because certain materials can actually block or reduce Wi-Fi signals. For instance, underfloor heating or foil-backed insulation can potentially block Wi-Fi signals.
So, you’ll need to look at Wi-Fi points for each room to ensure your smart home is as smart as it should be. But you should also consider installing a wired infrastructure to ensure your smart home functions perfectly should you have a weak or unreliable Wi-Fi signal.
5. Get a Complete Smart Home System
The easiest way to approach your smart home build could be to use the services of a company that provides smart home products and software for self-builds. You can then ensure that complete systems are seamlessly integrated into your home.
