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How do you move out of a smarthome?

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Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#51

Post by wyldfire »

edent wrote: post #43
wyldfire wrote: post #20

> do we hand over all the cloud passwords as well? Or do we factory reset everything and let them go through the dull process of setting up new accounts? Wow, I hope this is rhetorical. No, you never give anyone your password for anything. Yes, you absolutely let them go through the dull process of setting up new accounts. > When I move into a house, do I want to spend the first day looking up manuals online to try a…

I wasn't being rhetorical. If I have a separate account for my home - say 742EvergreenTerrace@example.com - then it would be easier to hand that account and password over the the new owner.

Yes, I suppose that does seem like an interesting solution. But it seems like more trouble to go through than it's worth. Not to mention that if the new owner is sufficiently paranoid, then maybe they wouldn't trust that changing the password is sufficient to remove your access. So it would be all for naught.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#53

Post by creep »

This might be a little tangential, but as interesting as the idea of a smarthome is, I'm not sure I'll ever buy into it. I've never tried it, so can't speak to the benefits, but on this topic I'm always reminded of how my mom decided on buying a 2004 Honda Civic in 2008. She wanted manual locks and windows, to minimize the possible failure scenarios, and I can understand why. Sure, it's a pain in the ass to manually roll the window down, but she'll never have to worry about it going wrong.

Moving out of a smarthome seems like a pain. I can imagine in the future that smarthome companies will roll out better authentication and setup processes, but in my paranoia I can imagine too many security issues that will arise. I don't want my home to be a gateway for breach in another dimension. I'm okay to turn the light on myself when I enter a room, set the thermostat, and water my own plants. I don't see a need for improvement there.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#54

Post by dennyis »

When I installed smart stuff in my home I kept the originals. When I sold earlier this year I switched everything back out before I listed it. It was worth the hassle to me. No one pays extra because the Nest thermostat is installed vs $30 basic. And I’m going to want to install another Nest in the next home so...

I haven’t installed any smart outlets but I would consider doing the same. Most of these jobs are super easy, and if you can’t handle it a $20/hr handyman certainly can.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#55

Post by adrianmonk »

jasonkostempski wrote: post #18
nathantotten wrote: post #2

I recently moved and took everything with me. This included replacing z-wave light switches and outlets with normal ones. I swapped everything out before we listed the house. The reality is that most people will just be confused by this sort of stuff and you aren’t going to get any extra money when you sell your house. It’s a pain, but assuming you don’t move very often it’s worth it. Now I have all the things in my…

I would consider it to devalue the home. I don't ever want that kind of thing in my house but, even if I did, I'm not going to trust anyone to properly transfer whatever cloud access they have to things in my home, so it will all have to be removed anyway.

This sort of thing happens with used cars. If it's all stock, the value is general higher than if the car has been modified with various aftermarket parts. I believe the main reason is that a stock vehicle is less of an unknown when it comes to repairs and maintenance.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#56

Post by ocdtrekkie »

maxerickson wrote: post #45
pavel_lishin wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you can take your cloud devices, and a new owner can just buy a new hub device with their own cloud account and connect the devices to it. That sounds like a pain in the ass. > if I was ever to leave home automation hardware behind, it'd be a "if you want to pay x on top of the already agreed upon price for the property, I'll leave it I don't want to buy new crap to deal with the crap you left behind. I'd argue tha…

I don't want to buy new crap to deal with the crap you left behind. I'd argue that you ought to pay me for dealing with some arbitrary hardware that I've now inherited. This is the equivalent of leaving some finicky boiler system whose spare parts can only be ordered from a single factory in Germany. In context they are also more or less offering to remove it for free. I expect that includes putting conventional fixt…

Indeed, an option like that would be purely: If you're going to want these, I can save myself the effort of swapping them if you want to buy them off me. Otherwise, I'll either reinstall the original equipment or buy new equipment. (New dumb light switches for my old condo cost me $1.95 a pop.)

At my old condo, one thing I left as a bit of a 'gift', was a extremely solid dual-arm TV wall mount. It was cheap for me to repurchase for my new place, and then they don't have the risk of screwing into the studs near but not in the holes I had mounted mine or such concerns that might weaken their own mount. I had all the hardware and instructions, which I left with it. This might've been a less handy choice had either the condo been large enough for other places for the TV to make sense or be appealing, or if the TV mount I had installed wasn't sturdy enough to support all possible TVs one might be bringing in.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#57

Post by ashark »

vincentkriek wrote: post #40
ashark wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We may be listing ours soon, and if we do I'm even swapping the LED bulbs for whatever's cheapest at the store. They're only about a year old and the house will sell for zero more dollars if I leave them up.

Is leaving lights in the house you sell an American thing? Unless it's built in lights like spots, all the bulbs and even fixtures usually move with the person where I'm from (the Netherlands).

Incandescent bulbs here are so cheap (and fragile, especially if they're used) they're definitely not worth bothering with, and they're still really common. Even CFLs are really cheap now, and don't travel as well (or last as long) as LEDs. Light fixtures would almost never go—either they're $20 pieces of crap that aren't worth unwiring (then wiring back up at the new place), or they're nice enough and suited specifically enough to the space that the new buyers definitely want them to stay. If you wanted to keep one you'd have to take it down before listing, and replace it with something else.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#58

Post by junkcollector »

gwbas1c wrote: post #17

I recently sold my home. I didn't take the plunge with smart switches, but I had Nest thermostats and Nest smoke alarms. I wish I either removed everything before putting my house on the market, or excluded them all from the sale. The buyer was confused, and the Nest smoke alarms needed to be replaced prior to closing. The Nest smoke alarms were fine, but due to local fire codes, I needed to have wifi running at insp…

Fire code requires that fire alarms be networked to alert people in all rooms in the event of a fire. Older un-networked units are grandfathers until you begin replacement. Wifi networking is allowed by the code, but for obvious reasons, the inspector has to verify that it works and is set up correctly which requires running wifi.

Personally I would not purchase a home that was configured with nest or other home automation equipment for several reasons.

1) It's a huge security risk. When you buy a home the first thing you do is change the locks because you don't know who the previous owner may have once loaned keys out to. Now you have a bunch of computers in your house giving remote access that may or may not be giving other people access and you can't tell.

2) Most consumer home automation systems have incredibly bad failure states. Those wirelessly networked alarms? When you cheap Chinese wifi router catches fire from a faulty power supply the failure mode is that you die. That's a pretty big oversight. Remember when NEST pushed an untested software update remotely and caused dozens of houses in the Northern Midwest to lose heat in the middle of winter and then be destroyed by broken pipes?

3) Vendor lock in. I don't want the previous owner to lock me into a line of products. Period. I'm sure everyone here remembers when Phillips decided that their smart light sockets would embrace DRM and only accept Phillips brand LED bulbs. They backed down but it is bound to come up again. Not to mention simple incompatibility between competing products and stacks.

4) It's just a damn pain to use most of the time for gain that can be measured almost entirely in novelty factor.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#59

Post by j45 »

I am setting everything in my home up with it's own email account and gear.

Additionally - use something like a raspberry pi or an appliance that will remain with the home. If I decide to rent it out, or leave it behind, its not tied to me, but is still manageable.

Re: How do you move out of a smarthome?

#60

Post by bluGill »

ashark wrote: post #36
jasonkostempski wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would consider it to devalue the home. I don't ever want that kind of thing in my house but, even if I did, I'm not going to trust anyone to properly transfer whatever cloud access they have to things in my home, so it will all have to be removed anyway.

I think a similar effect has been why power generation and efficiency systems (solar, "geothermal" heating/cooling) have been slow to catch on—for every buyer who sees them as a nice thing there's another who's turned off by them, and another who doesn't care enough to pay much extra. And even the ones who think they're good probably won't pay the pro-rated cost of putting it in, so you're still losing some money. Ki…

Where I live geothermo heating/cooling is listed in the ads for some houses. I recall when we were looking the realtor made sure we knew which houses had geothermo. We ended up with a regular air source heat pump, but geothermo is recognized as a selling point at least even if it doens't add value.
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