What Are You Going To Do If/When You Sell Your House?

[Wingsy]

Chances are really good that if I sold my house the buyer won't have a clue about how to keep all these Insteon things ticking. I guess I'll tell them that if there's a problem (no, "when" there is a problem) they can try to find an electrician with experience in this stuff or to just yank out the problem devices and go back to ole timey switches. What will you do?

[larryllix]

I sold a house years ago full of X10. The market wasn't good then and it took a few years. I wanted to keep the X10 modules so after the offer was signed I took the wall switches out and repaced them with the smal rocket type mechanicals that matched the rest of the house.

I worriedabout this for the next few months until the day of the closing inspection. When the people came to inspect, the first the women did was to go immediately to the switch in the front hallway and demand, "What happened to to the weird switch that was in here?" I told her some BS about being part of the security system that wasn't included, and she retorted, "Good! We thought we were going to have to get an electrician to replace them all."  

There has been many discussions about this over the years and my take is, it depends on the area and price of the house. Most people do not want HA in their home, or they would already have it. I feel it is like a badly done by the owner basement. I am just going to have to rip it out before I can do it properly.

I have three very techie sons and none of them like HA. Every time they come to stay I find all three bedrooms with disconnected lamp modules (no WAF?), as the stupid things kept going off when they got in bed, or the light might have woke the baby up, despite only  coming on at 11% after 8 PM.

Typically home buyers don't like weird. If that is showing, then what have you done behind the walls? The trouble is, you will get no feedback on it, and the buyer just never comes back. Here the Realestate agents make sure you never meet the buyers. I found RealEstate agents will not even advertise the feature either, and that would be a good starter to attract a certain type that would even appreciate it.

But times are a changin' too. I still have all the X10 modules in a junk box in my storage room.  

[Bumbershoot]

I've tried to design this installation so that if I take my ISY away, the house will still operate as one would expect any house would operate, meaning that the razzle/dazzle is almost entirely controlled by ISY programs.  I might turn off the LEDs on the OutletLincs/SwitchLincs and unplug the ISY if showing the house, but otherwise, things should work almost entirely without surprises if no controller/eccentric husband is around to manage it all (this was an early request from the Mrs.).

Folks in my neighborhood are warming up to HA (I thank Alexa, iRobot/Roomba, Nest, security systems, home theater, etc. for that).  I see a lot of service trucks from local HA vendors/installers sitting in driveways around here, and new construction seems to always include either a Control4 installation or at least a fancy HA controlled media room.

At this point, my only concern is the long-term viability of the gear I've installed.  I don't expect that people will be interested in the same gear ten years from now, nor will I still be interested in keeping functional, though obsolete Insteon/Z-Wave stuff around.  I expect I'll have to do a periodic swap-out of my HA gear to keep it somewhat current -- I see that as a maintenance expense.  It's a hobby, after all, and cheaper than a cellar full of fancy wine or a late-life crisis sports car...

I think @larryllix is right, it depends somewhat on the neighborhood and the price of the house.  And again, times are changin...  Somebody's buying all that gear.

[larryllix]

As an afterthought I have had freak-out guests ask me if the MSs in the bedrooms were webcams.

[carealtor]

I've been through this a couple of times.  I take out ALL the HA light switches and such before putting the house on the market.  When I buy a house I install systems that CAN be automated, but will also function on their own and as people expect.  For instance, Ecobee thermostats, RainMachine sprinkler controller, Pentair pool controller, Vista 20P alarm...  All these can be integrated into HA, but work great without HA too.

[Teken]

One thing I can tell you with 100% certainty you will NEVER be able to sell a house that is mis-wired properly or expected sale price. Two houses I was part of the HA integration the home owner ran home runs for lots of common switches in hopes of a cleaner look on the walls. Fast forward four years later he needed to move due to work requirements. His home sat on the market for 16 months.

Had to take a major hit because people were asking where the hell are all the switches?!?!

Only a freaking moron would wire a house with no local wiring for the specific loads. Unless you plan on dying in your home like I do don't even think about wiring your home in a none standard way because it will drop the sale price by 30~45%!  

[Wingsy]

With few exceptions I had my house wired so any dimmer could be replaced with a standard switch, with traveler wires where needed. I do have keypads at every entrance (whose main switch controls the room lighting) but I also have separate dimmer switches right beside them that control the porch lights,  ceiling fan and some floodlights. The keypads do things like all floodlights on, set room lights to dim, turn on driveway lights, and turn on dining room lights. The dinning room (actually a corner of the great room) is the kicker there - there is no physical switch for it; it's on a nearby keypad that controls an inline dimmer. Those lights were added after the house was finished. Another inline fanlinc, not controlled by any switch (yet - I'm using my iPhone at present), runs the fans on the back porch. Another inline dimmer controls the lights on the columns at the end of the driveway (switch located IN the column), and finally an inline dimmer that controls a single light at the outside foyer (it's linked to the front porch lights). It would be a simple matter to revert all that (except dinning room and fans) to standard switches. If I had to run any additional wiring inside the outside walls, I think I'm screwed - it's a log home and the outside walls already have all the wiring they'll ever get.

My automatic stairway and driveway lights (and driveway chime) may also be a problem. The future owners would have to revert to a manual switch. That may soon change though. I'm working on a way to automatically control those lights without needing ISY or Insteon (but I would need something ELSE, like a time delay relay. But surely any electrician could repair that if it ever failed).

It sometimes worries me that in 10 years I may not be able to buy an Insteon wall dimmer, or another ISY, or another PLM.

[lilyoyo1]

I built my house so i had control over the wiring. I made sure that they wired it in a standard way (limited to no more than 4 switches per wall box). I stand use standard dinners for all the loads but I use kpls still to control the room. 

My house is set up to operate without the ISY. I did this so that convenience is lost not functionality should the ISY or plm go down. All of this allows me to leave everything behind should i move (I'd want new switches anyway) and the home owner want to keep the system. Should they not, I can simply pull everything out and replace with standard switches. 

The hardest thing to replace would be my flood lights as those use inlinelinc dimmers and are not wired direct to a switch. With that said, I would simply replace them with a cheap motion controlled flood light. 

[lilyoyo1]

1 hour ago, carealtor said:

I've been through this a couple of times.  I take out ALL the HA light switches and such before putting the house on the market.  When I buy a house I install systems that CAN be automated, but will also function on their own and as people expect.  For instance, Ecobee thermostats, RainMachine sprinkler controller, Pentair pool controller, Vista 20P alarm...  All these can be integrated into HA, but work great without HA too.

I agree with this. I use alot of 3rd party stuff that works equally well with or without the ISY. I like simplicity in my designs. Everything is done in a way where guests don't need a manual to use things out feel the need to ask 101 questions

[lilyoyo1]

30 minutes ago, Wingsy said:

With few exceptions I had my house wired so any dimmer could be replaced with a standard switch, with traveler wires where needed. I do have keypads at every entrance (whose main switch controls the room lighting) but I also have separate dimmer switches right beside them that control the porch lights,  ceiling fan and some floodlights. The keypads do things like all floodlights on, set room lights to dim, turn on driveway lights, and turn on dining room lights. The dinning room (actually a corner of the great room) is the kicker there - there is no physical switch for it; it's on a nearby keypad that controls an inline dimmer. Those lights were added after the house was finished. Another inline fanlinc, not controlled by any switch (yet - I'm using my iPhone at present), runs the fans on the back porch. Another inline dimmer controls the lights on the columns at the end of the driveway (switch located IN the column), and finally an inline dimmer that controls a single light at the outside foyer (it's linked to the front porch lights). It would be a simple matter to revert all that (except dinning room and fans) to standard switches. If I had to run any additional wiring inside the outside walls, I think I'm screwed - it's a log home and the outside walls already have all the wiring they'll ever get.

My automatic stairway and driveway lights (and driveway chime) may also be a problem. The future owners would have to revert to a manual switch. That may soon change though. I'm working on a way to automatically control those lights without needing ISY or Insteon (but I would need something ELSE, like a time delay relay. But surely any electrician could repair that if it ever failed).

It sometimes worries me that in 10 years I may not be able to buy an Insteon wall dimmer, or another ISY, or another PLM.

I wouldn't worry about that part. Even if all of them went out of business, there will be another technology and another controller around to switch to. It's not like your system would immediately stop working and parts would be available for sometime afterwards as well.

[larryllix]

My son bought a massive house a few years old with illegal wiring in it. Trouble is there is nothing you can do about it. By the time you figure out the washing machine has a defective GFCI receptacle making it erratic, located behind a built in fridge in the kitchen, it's years down the road and no court is going to sit and listen to things, when you had an idiot rated home inspector go through it to your satisfaction, before laying down your Bitcoins. Half the walls would have to be ripped apart to fix all the white hot wires used in the upstairs wiring.

Every month or so when I visit I find another gottcha' that should be cause for gun ownership   in Canada.

What can be done? Sell it to some other unsuspecting non-tech sucker, that may never know some receptacles have no power. Not nice, but either was the purchase.

Buyer beware.

In my next life I wouldn't touch a house with work that looks like a self-styled contractor. Who knows what evil lurks in the darkness of the walls?

[Wingsy]

Here's something I think you guys might like. If you're a girl you'll just probably ask "Why?". Guys know why.

I have a friend who owns a tower company. At about the time I was building my house he was replacing the strobe lights on many of his towers and gave me a couple of the older models. For normal lighting I put a circular LED in the base of the lights and mounted them on top of my driveway columns. Works well. The strobe was still functional and I left it that way. And sometimes at night when I'm feeling a little crazy I'll fire them up. As you may know, tower strobes focus the light into a horizontal circular beam. When you're close to one of these on a tower, the main beam goes right over your head. When it's 7 feet off the ground and you're 50 feet away, those two 2-million-candlepower strobes hit you like a supernova. It'll burn the outline of the trees right into your retina. You should see it.  When I sell I'll have to find someone as eccentric as I am.

I justified this by saying that I'll hook it up to my burglar alarm and if it doesn't scare away the crooks at least they'll be there blinded when the police arrive.

The strobes are hooked up to an Insteon switch but after a couple of ALL-ON events I unplugged the strobe part. When I do a demo I have to plug it in first. Oh well.

[Goose66]

When I sold my house last year, I removed most of the Insteon switches, but left the Icon switches in the basement because it was convenient for the kids to be able to turn off the entire basement at the KPL at the top of the stairs, and I knew the buyer had kids too. I replaced the KPL with the oldest one in my house, factory reset all of the switches, and setup all the Insteon links again without the ISY in the mix. I also had wall sconces and wall lamps in a few bedrooms that had been added after the original house wiring using InlineLincs. I removed the InlineLincs and wired the sconces into the swtiched outlet circuit in the bedroom so the lights would turn on and off with the switch. Not the fine grain control of being able to turn on just the one on your side of the bed with a mini remote or bedside KPL, but fully functional without someone saying "What happened to the wall sconces on this wall that was in your listing photos?!?"

[Mustang65]

4 hours ago, Wingsy said:

Here's something I think you guys might like. If you're a girl you'll just probably ask "Why?". Guys know why.

I have a friend who owns a tower company. At about the time I was building my house he was replacing the strobe lights on many of his towers and gave me a couple of the older models. For normal lighting I put a circular LED in the base of the lights and mounted them on top of my driveway columns. Works well. The strobe was still functional and I left it that way. And sometimes at night when I'm feeling a little crazy I'll fire them up. As you may know, tower strobes focus the light into a horizontal circular beam. When you're close to one of these on a tower, the main beam goes right over your head. When it's 7 feet off the ground and you're 50 feet away, those two 2-million-candlepower strobes hit you like a supernova. 

 

Before moving to Florida, I lived in Northern Illinois at the Wisconsin border. I travelled 40 miles to work each day and would return home in the winter when it was dark. A lot of my travel was done on a 2 lane country road. Each night I would encounter the same drivers heading in the other direction, unfortunately that was toward me. The same ones would have their bright lights on and if I flashed, they would not go to LOW beams, they kept the lights on HIGH beam. I would have to look off to the side,  before we passed each other. 

I had a BRIGHT idea, mount a small planes Halogen landing lights under my front bumper.  My friend was a small plane maintenance technician, and got me (2) 25,000 or 30,000 candle power bulbs. I think that is the candlepower for them. I bought (2) 12 volt batteries and a controller that would charge them at 12Volts and when the Landing Light switch was hit, converted the batteries to 24volts, and lit up the world in front of me. Worked something like the starter/charger for the (2) 6 volt batteries in my '66 Volkswagen. It would charge at 6 volts, but when I turned the key to start it changed them to 12VDC. 

Well, the LANDING lights worked GREAT.  I was amazed how far you can see with them on! After the installation weekend, come Monday night, and on my way home from work, the same drivers heading toward me (when they passed I recognized them). I figured I would give them the benefit of the doubt, when they were way, way, way down the road approaching me, I did a quick flash of the regular bright lights. They did not dim there's!  So I gave them a FLASH of the landing lights.  One of them did not dim his/her lights so I gave them a LONGER FLASH of the landing lights. It was interesting how they began acknowledging my regular car's high beam after a few nights.

I loved driving with those lights on (when no one was coming toward me), but the 24 volt battery power would not last that long. I guess that is how you fight fire with fire or in my case light with LIGHT!

 

Edited March 18, 2018 by Mustang65

[larryllix]

3 hours ago, Mustang65 said:

Before moving to Florida, I lived in Northern Illinois at the Wisconsin border. I travelled 40 miles to work each day and would return home in the winter when it was dark. A lot of my travel was done on a 2 lane country road. Each night I would encounter the same drivers heading in the other direction, unfortunately that was toward me. The same ones would have their bright lights on and if I flashed, they would not go to LOW beams, they kept the lights on HIGH beam. I would have to look off to the side,  before we passed each other. 

I had a BRIGHT idea, mount a small planes Halogen landing lights under my front bumper.  My friend was a small plane maintenance technician, and got me (2) 25,000 or 30,000 candle power bulbs. I think that is the candlepower for them. I bought (2) 12 volt batteries and a controller that would charge them at 12Volts and when the Landing Light switch was hit, converted the batteries to 24volts, and lit up the world in front of me. Worked something like the starter/charger for the (2) 6 volt batteries in my '66 Volkswagen. It would charge at 6 volts, but when I turned the key to start it changed them to 12VDC. 

Well, the LANDING lights worked GREAT.  I was amazed how far you can see with them on! After the installation weekend, come Monday night, and on my way home from work, the same drivers heading toward me (when they passed I recognized them). I figured I would give them the benefit of the doubt, when they were way, way, way down the road approaching me, I did a quick flash of the regular bright lights. They did not dim there's!  So I gave them a FLASH of the landing lights.  One of them did not dim his/her lights so I gave them a LONGER FLASH of the landing lights. It was interesting how they began acknowledging my regular car's high beam after a few nights.

I loved driving with those lights on (when no one was coming toward me), but the 24 volt battery power would not last that long. I guess that is how you fight fire with fire or in my case light with LIGHT!

 

Yeah, some of the newer xenon bulbs have height adjustments in the car to compensate for suspension tilt etc. (Mazda is one) and the driver adjust those highly focused beams incorrectly. This shouldn't even be  legal. My next door neighbour and I share rides occasionally to the theatre in the next town. He has this newer Mazda and is wondering why everybody is flashing their lights at him. After about a month of this he read the manual and tells me there is an adjustment for height on the dash. Geeesh!! These things are so focused you can see the distinct line of the light and dark on the forest trees, miles ahead.

Edited March 18, 2018 by larryllix

[stillen_i30]

I just sold my house which had numerous insteon devices throughout. I had an isy 994 that was non pro and quickly needed the pro version as my network grew. So the 994 was going to be useless and i left that behind for the new owners. I kept all my plug in modules. I left all my keypads and switchlincs. I left 3 inlinelincs for the motion sensing floods which were too high up to retrieve and rewire again. also left behind some outdoor modules that were high up (for those globe lights). After reducing the number of devices, the 994 non pro was able to accommodate all the devices. I wanted to take out some keypadlincs but the wiring was too complicated when I did them, esp since the original decora switches were screw type connections and the insteon ones are wire twist. So some of the neutrals and hots that had jumpers to a wire twist were gone as I had directly wired them and was too lazy to go back and undo everything. Some of my switches were pretty old, like 2011 and 2012. I left behind basic information on how to log into the ISY and wrote on there that I recommend hiring an electrician or home automation company. The new owners still would have their realtor send my realtor emails on how to do this and that long after the sale was complete. I stopped responding since I have two jobs as a busy doc and didn't have time with two little kids and dealing with our new place (much older). It isn't easy to put in a network and it's definitely hard to take it back out. 

[glacier991]

I just sold a house that was HA using X-10 mainly. I removed all of the switches and in line controllers, motion sensors and door/window sensors prior to close. (I can relate to the "I have a box full of.." comments on here from time to time). I also rented the house during winters (it was in ski country) and I too had people thinking motion sensors were cameras. One renter went to far as to cover anything anyone could remotely think might be surreptious, and he/she left their coverings there (including gum in a screw hole on a small x-10 motion sensor) I think to a large degree we HA afficiandos are a small lot, and while folks love the "gee whiz", don't want it for themselves.That may be s l o w l y changing.

Edited March 19, 2018 by glacier991
typos and clarity.

[Wingsy]

On 3/17/2018 at 8:34 PM, Mustang65 said:

I had a BRIGHT idea, mount a small planes Halogen landing lights under my front bumper.

 

Mustang, I did that too! When I was 16 or 17 I put a landing light from an old Piedmont Airlines F-27 in the front of my car, and for the same reason you did. My car looked like an oncoming train when I had that light on. But from that moment on, I never met anyone who didn't dim when I flashed my regular headlights, so never got to really try them out. Traded cars soon after that and had to remove them.

I feel like you'd be a candidate for buying my 2-million-candlepower house when I sell.

Edited March 19, 2018 by Wingsy

[Wingsy]

On 3/17/2018 at 11:37 PM, larryllix said:

 These things are so focused you can see the distinct line of the light and dark on the forest trees, miles ahead.

And when someone with those lights is behind you it appears that they are constantly flashing their lights at you as they hit minor bumps in the road.

[larryllix]

11 minutes ago, Wingsy said:

And when someone with those lights is behind you it appears that they are constantly flashing their lights at you as they hit minor bumps in the road.

That may explain some of it! I think I have experienced that, wondering if I should pull over and wait for them.

Edited March 19, 2018 by larryllix