Hey there,
I just learned about HA few days ago and I’m addicted haha.
I used to do commercial HVAC controls, we would make the panels, install all sensors, wire, build graphics for the front end and connect all the points. This was over 10 years ago and I forgot most of the stuff I knew lol
I have a property I manage with about 4 houses on it, they are all pretty much right next to each other. The owners already have the unifi mesh system all around the property.
These houses are almost in a remote area. No other wiif connections appear when searching.
What I did so far was just fire up the Raspberry PI and added some random smart devices I had around the house. I got the google mini and few philips light bulbs working… Just getting those 2 things to work got me excited and hooked =)
I’m here to see if I can get any recommendations on a proper setup from any long term users of HA. I don’t want to start in the wrong direction and 3 months from now hit some kind of limit or issues I could have foreseen by just checking with this amazing community =)
I will be setting this up for the home owners, I live on the property so its a perfect place for me to learn all the bugs and figure out how to set it all up. So I will be treating it more as a commercial setup than some just DIY fun. This is where I’m confused on the best devices, sensors, cameras etc… to use with HA.
I want to start small but be able to expand as needed.
I would like to do the following stuff, not all at once but just a general list.
- lights/switches
- cameras
- stuff like leak detectors, motion sensors, temp sensors, door locks
- hook monitoring on the electrical break panels
-i guess pretty much anything I can automate. I want to try hahah =)
The home owners would be paying for all the stuff. I was told they could save at least 20k a year in insurance cost if they had some kind of system that has stuff like cameras, door sensors installed… This place is like a bed & breakfast, so I guess that is why the insurance is high and they require extra steps. So I’m not looking for the cheapest end devices by also not looking to just waste money on name brand devices if the off brand is just as good.
Sorry for the long article. I just jumped into this 1000000% and now kinda stalled because I’m not sure what is the best way to start.
thanks for reading.