“Wink, Wink…Say No More”

Slightly older real estate mogul subscribers might remember this line from an old Monty Python sketch, but it really could be applied to the latest piece of technology we’ve found for home automation.

These days, you’re seeing all sorts of home and automobile companies trying to outdo themselves to make cars and homes as high-tech as possible.

For cars, the self-driving automobile is not too far away. There are many other high-tech gadgets in cars as well that keep us safer, save us money and make driving more enjoyable.

Home automation is going down the same path. It’s estimated that the global market for automated home products will hit $2.8 billion by 2015. People want their homes to be automated, just like their cars.

And they are willing to pay for it.

Let’s Get In On the Action

As investors, we want to give homeowners what they want. If you are flipping a house, or maybe have a high-end rental, which house will potential buyers like more?

A house with mechanical everything? Or, a house that does everything from the buyer’s smartphone?

Seems like a pretty easy answer. Now if there was just an app that did that for us…

Well there is. It’s called…yup, you guessed it: Wink.

Wink is an app that can connect with all sorts of other remote control devices in your home. It’s able to connect with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, zigbee, and Z-Wave radio signals to control devices such as:

Lights
Locks
Garage Door Openers
Appliances
Cameras
Water Heaters
Smoke Detectors
Thermostats
Window Air Conditioners

By being able to ‘talk’ to so many other devices, it means you can keep upgrading your home products and one app will still be able to control them.

Wink works with both Apple and Android devices. The app is free to download, but you also have to buy a hub to mount in your home to control everything. The hub is normally about $50, but Home Depot will drop the price to $0.99 if you buy two products that connect to Wink.

The hub is easy to mount to a power source in the house. The only caveat the manufacturer recommends is that the hub is more than 5 feet from any other wireless connectivity device, like a router. You also need an internet connection to have it work.

Once you are connected, the Wink app works with products from many different manufacturers. Many manufacturers of home products will put a ‘Wink Certified’ seal on their products to let you know they work with Wink – either with or without the hub:

The Wink app has some other cool features too:

You can set schedules for your home, so that lights and thermostats turn on and off at pre-determined times.
You can use the ‘Geo-Fencing’ feature to link Wink with a GPS signal. Then as you drive up to your house, Wink senses you are coming and does some preset action such as raise the temperature, open blinds and start the oven.
You can use ‘robots’ to make ‘If...then’ actions happen. In other words, say you want the kitchen lights to turn on when the garage door opens. The Wink ‘robots’ can be programmed to make a list of things happen when something else happens.
You can group actions in one Wink button. Say you want all the lights in your house turned off when you leave in the morning. Set up one button to press and they all go out.

Seems Expensive and Complicated

Wink has only been on the market since the summer of 2014, and there are a few bugs to work out, but improvements are coming out all the time. There are also alternative home systems such as Apple’s Homekit and Vera, but Wink seems to have the most support from home product manufacturers and retailers.

So why would us cost-conscious investors indulge in all this expensive home automation?

Because, increasingly, that is what our buyers want.

Imagine your flipped house, all finished and on the market. Every month it sits is costing you hundreds or maybe more than a thousand bucks. For about one month of holding expenses, you can install most of this automation.

You can also add a Wink control panel on the wall, so potential buyers can see what the app will do for them without having to download it.

Then, when potential buyers come to see the house, they will be amazed at what they can do from their smartphone. Just like granite countertops and stainless steel appliances, those little extras can really push a buyer to buy your house instead of the competition.

Also, one or two thousand invested in home automation may also raise the price $5-$10K for you. That’s a great return on your investment.

Ask ‘What do buyers want?’ – It really pays to talk to people, do internet research and look around to see what is trending. What will sell or rent your places the fastest for top dollar?

Investigate home automation – Either get on the bus or get run over by it. Prices will continue to fall for many house devices. Stay on top of the trends. Think about how you could use home automation in your rentals and flips.

Don’t just look at electronics – There are a lot of cool things coming out in home construction and rehab in general. Stay on top of those trends as well to save money when rehabbing and make your investments more appealing.