Before You Sign: 5 Questions to Ask About Your Home Technology

You can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars building a home, but if you aren’t careful about the technology contract, you could end up with a system you don’t fully control.

We’ve seen contracts that include mandatory long-term service agreements, recurring monitoring fees and proprietary systems that lock homeowners into working with one integrator. We’ve also seen systems underspecified from the start, leaving the homeowner with no choice but to go back to the original installer when they need to add something later.

What is proprietary lock-in?

Put simply, it’s when your technology is tied to one company.

You may own the equipment, but only the original integrator can access the programming, make changes or add new components without significant additional costs. If you decide you want to work with someone else, you may find that switching isn’t nearly as simple as it should be.

And we’ve seen how expensive that can get.

One client recently bought a home with a locked technology system. They didn’t have a relationship with the original installer, who then tried to use that position to force a hardware sale. The alternative was ripping out the existing system and starting over.

The cost: $30,000.

That’s exactly why we don’t design closed systems. We use open architecture and create universal, portable plans so the homeowner owns the technology and isn’t tied to one vendor for the life of the home.

Five questions to ask before signing

Before you sign any technology contract, ask:

1. Warranty & Service How long is the system covered, and what will service calls cost after the warranty expires?

2. System Access Is the system open or closed? Do you have your own login and access, or does the dealer control it?

3. Contracts Is a recurring service or monitoring contract required? If so, how long are you committed?

4. Response Times If something goes wrong, what is the guaranteed response time?

5. Resale What happens to the system and any service agreements when you sell the home? Can the next homeowner choose their own integrator?

Technology should make owning a home easier, not tie you to a company indefinitely.

Our goal is simple: design the system so it works for you today, and gives you choices tomorrow.