Traveling is an excellent opportunity for self-development. You get to broaden your horizons by exploring different cultures, seeing the historical achievements of humanity, and admiring all the wonders of nature our planet has to offer. But to get the most out of your adventures, you need to feel safe leaving your home behind. After all, you won’t have as much fun when traveling if you’re constantly concerned about the state of your empty house. But is there anything you can do to make this anxiety go away or at least worry less?
Fortunately, you can now protect your place while traveling by using the power of modern technology. Below, you’ll find the best smart home devices to safeguard your house while you’re away.
A smart home is equipped with various devices that can be programmed and controlled remotely from your smartphone; all you need is an Internet connection. As you will see, that functionality can be a great boon to you.
Get Yourself Outdoor Smart Security Cameras
Traditional home security cameras have been a very popular solution among homeowners for decades. Now, thanks to the advent of smart technology, they have been significantly improved.
Classic systems tend to be connected to display the inside of your house and record the footage on an SD card. That is a great solution for homeowners who rarely leave their property for long, but not so for avid travelers. After all, how are you supposed to see the state of your place if security footage is only available back at home?
Outdoor smart cameras are a much better choice here, as they allow you to connect the individual devices to your Wi-Fi network and then to a dedicated app. Thanks to that, as long as you have Internet access during your trip, you are able to access livestreams from your smart cameras and even save the recordings to the cloud. This is very useful in determining the potential harm done to your house and when dealing with the aftermath.
For example, if you live in Dallas and your garage door has been damaged in a car theft attempt, you don’t have to cancel your Himalayan trekking vacation and return immediately. Because you have a constant live stream feed of your premises, you can simply call a good garage door repair shop in Texas, hire them to service or replace your door and monitor the progress in real-time.
Buy Smart Lightbulbs
Smart lightbulbs might not be designed as security devices themselves, but they can still be very effective at protecting your home.
Similar to smart home cameras, smart bulbs work by connecting to an app through the Internet. This might seem like a pointless measure – after all, why would you want long-distance control over something that it’s going to be switched off while you’re absent?
The issue is, in theory, your lights should be left switched on. Dark windows are often a clear sign that there’s no one home. That, in turn, can discourage any robber who’s looking for an easy place to plunder. However, in practice, leaving the lights on for the duration of your trip is usually out of the question – your bulbs would be working 24/7, possibly raising your electricity bills from minimal to worryingly high.
Smart lightbulbs are a solution here. You can easily operate them via your smartphone or tablet. Just click on a button in the dedicated app, and your entire home will light up immediately, even if you’re thousands of miles away. Then, just turn the lights off once it’s day again. This way, you’re not only lowering your energy usage but also maintaining the illusion of an inhabited place.
But what if you’re about to visit an area with no Internet access at all? Thankfully, a lot of apps allow you to set a daily schedule for your lights, meaning that your house would be safer even when you can’t connect to it.
Purchase Smart Detectors
Burglars aren’t the only threat to your house. In fact, significant damage can be done to it without any people involved.
Water Sensors
We often associate water damage with natural disasters such as floods or tsunamis. However, more often than not, the culprit is different. Leaks can quickly turn your pristine home into a flooded mess. If a pipe bursts while you’re away in a different city or country, it might be hours before someone contacts you with the bad news. In that time, this water can do irreversible damage to your furniture, rugs, or wooden floors. A small leak from the faucet might not be enough to destroy your home, but over time it can make it damp enough to allow molds to form.
A smart water leak detector can help you protect your home from such accidents. The moment it detects significant moisture, it will send you notification alerts. This means you can contact a plumber well before any serious damage occurs. Some of the more expensive models even have a shutoff function, cutting off the water supply to your home in an emergency.
Smoke Detectors
The presence of smoke in your empty home is even more terrifying than usual because there’s no other explanation for it than a fire. Fortunately, smart smoke detectors can help you minimize the damage done to your property by immediately sending push notifications to your phone or tablet. In many cases, you can set these alerts to play a loud alarm or siren on arrival so that there’s no chance to miss the warning even if you are sleeping.
Conclusion
As you can see, there’s a lot you can do to protect your home while traveling. Hopefully, now you see how smart technology can be used for that purpose.
Outdoor smart security cameras can be a great way to keep an eye on your property while you’re absent. Smart lightbulbs enable you to trick potential robbers into believing that someone’s home and therefore prevent break-ins. Finally, smart detectors can help you deal with potential hazards like water damage or fire.
So, if you’re an avid traveler, you might want to consider getting at least a few smart home devices and make your empty home safer than ever!
