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F E A T U R E

Home Smart Home

January 7, 2002
By Michael J. DeMaria

But Honey, It's Not Expensive. Really.


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The people we spoke to at ITT Industries estimate that installing a smart home would cost less than $5,000, including wiring, labor and some electronics. If you build a new home for $250,000, adding $5,000 is a small investment. On a 30-year mortgage at 7.50 percent, you would pay, at most, an extra $35 a month. Smaller, wireless or simple home-automation installations may be nothing more costly than a birthday gift. X-10 components, which do automation over home power lines, have a low entry cost as well; you can buy a starter kit from www.smarthome.com for less than $90, with additional modules ranging from $10 to $20, depending on features and needs. Of course, you can also spend a tad less than $2,000 for a complete setup that lets you control multiple rooms via a voice-recognition system. Products are made by a variety of companies, including Home Controls, which makes HomeVoice; HomeSeer Technologies; Leviton; and Philips Magnavox. ITT Industries focuses on the structured wiring and high-bandwidth applications more than on automation equipment.

One of the driving pushes for smart-home technology and wiring in new construction is resale value. We expect smart-house technologies and home LANs to take off -- in a few years everyone will want in. Then, homes that do not have structured wiring will be less desirable. Today people are willing to pay more for a house that has polarized and grounded plugs and is fully wired for cable television. Structured wiring for smart homes is a natural extension of this.

The business of retrofitting existing houses may get a boost in a few years. Structured wiring is now targeted for new installations, since the cost of retrofitting is high. The exception is if a house is undergoing major reconstruction in which the walls may be ripped out. Of course, retrofitting a house with the walls intact is not impossible, just time-consuming. We would not want to underestimate the advantages of wireless in this area.