Home MaintenanceHome Management

Home Automation Vs Home Maintenance

When it comes to renting or owning your first home no one ever really tells you how much work it takes to keep your home clean, functioning and in good repair. We are all trying to find ways to reduce the time it takes to do our chores, save money and still have a functionally beautiful home.  In modern times there are so many options and methods out there to improve your life. If you’re like me and my partners here at the Honey Do List Solutions the first thing that comes to mind is home maintenance and home automation.  I am hoping to share with you my knowledge and answer the following question and topics?

  1. What is home maintenance?
  2. What is home automation?
  3. Home Automation vs. Home Maintenance

First things first in order to understand home maintenance vs home automation we should know what each of them mean.

What is home maintenance and why is it important?

Home maintenance can be defined as all inspections, modifications, cleaning, repairs and adjustments made to your home that should be completed on a regular and planned basis. These regular actions are taken in order to ensure a clean, functional and efficient home.

Some home maintenance examples:

  • Spraying for pests and spiders
  • Changing air filters
  • Inspecting gas lines and wires
  • Inspecting and tuning up your Furnace, Water Heaters and AC units
  • Inspecting and repairing Car
  • Cleaning your home on a regular basis

But why is it important? No one wants to spend their weekends doing time consuming home repairs and cleaning. Well the answer for us is simple, these regular “chores” will save you money and protect you from unforeseen home repair and family emergencies.  These weekly, monthly and yearly activities may feel like a pain but are not as inconvenient as trying to get in touch with an Ac repair technician, or a flood restoration company. Not only that, you are protecting the safety of your family and the integrity of your home from pests, such as poisonous spiders, gas leaks and other costly issues that occur from lack of repair and maintenance.

What is home automation?

Home automation, also known as domotics, is the use of electronically and remotely controllable technology to control of required household activities, appliances and many functions we do to keep our homes functionally beautiful. Though in other terms it is tools and technology we use to control utilities, lights and do some of our chores for us. As an example, My wife and I use a Roomba to vacuum our home twice a week so that we can spend the time it would normally take doing things we want to do. Check out the following Home automation and Internet of Things technology you could use to make your life easier:

  • Robotic Vacuum Cleaners and mops ( ex. Roomba)
  • Smart Home Thermostat (Nest Thermostat, Ecobee)
  • Smart and Video Doorbells ( Nest Hello, Ring Doorbell)
  • Smart Sprinkler controller (Rachio 3)
  • Smart home security systems ( Vivint Smart Home, ADT Smart Home)
  • Light control and dimmer systems (ConnectSense)
  • Smart speakers and displays ( Google Home Hub, Amazon Echo)
  • Robotic Lawn Mower (Husqvarna Automower)

As you can see home automation is starting to affect more areas of your home and life. The more it grows the easier your life may become. We use these tools every day and they can be used to help you keep up with your home maintenance chores.

Home Automation Vs. Home Maintenance

Like many of us we confuse the difference between home automation and home maintenance or home repair. After researching the difference and sharing the definitions with you it has become clear that home maintenance is the steps and actions that need to be taken to keep you house functioning and safe. Where Home automation is technology and tools to help you with your home maintenance, repair and ease of life.

Just to share with you a way that my family has recently experienced where home automation can be used to keep up with my home maintenance tasks. As the weather has been changing, we have realized that our home at certain points during the day becomes too cold or too warm. We have to walk to our thermostat and manually change the from cool to heat and vice versa. So, we decided to purchase a smart thermostat to help regulate our home temperature and keep the temperature consistent throughout the year. Not only will it keep us comfortable it can also save some money on our electric and gas bills.

In conclusion home automation and home maintenance are not the same but work together in protecting your homes integrity and your family. I encourage you to find ways to keep up and automate your home maintenance activities using home automation technology and our home management binder, calendar guide and templates (coming soon). So if you are feeling overwhelmed, anxious or nervous you are missing something, don’t worry there are many resources that can and will help you overcome and succeed in your home maintenance efforts.