Selling a Home with DIY HA
- Thread starter ginigma
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Sacedog
Active Member
Well, with they type of attitude, you will cut out a large number of potential buyers, and even possibly not sell your home for as much as it is worth. The more buyers there is, the more your house is worth.
I'm not trying to argue, or devalue your opinion; I too used to love my house. I just sold my house in May of this year. It did not have automation in it, so I can't argue one way or the other on that issue.
What it did have was a georgous backyard, which I built by hand; myself. Custom patio cover with hand hewn beams, and routed columns, brick piliars and paths, beautifully manacured plants and grass, LV lighting, outdoor fans, multiple fountains, etc. I spent a lot of time during the course of living in that house, working on the backyard, and came to love it. When it came time to sell it however, I realized that I can't care who will buy it; I can't care if they will water the plants, or keep the fountain water clear, or fertilize the grass. What I did care about is that they bought the house. I got lucky in this market, and my house was only on MLS for 3 days before it sold.
I guess my point is that when it comes time to sell your house, it is more important to care about if and how much you sell it for, instead of if the new owners will understand how to use the HA (unless of course you have money to spare). Remember, you will be moving to a bigger and better home...once you sell the old one, you wont care that much about it anymore.
ver0776
Active Member
I agree, I just was not clear. I just said it through proxy (if buyers love the HA, then they will pay for it). If they want to turn it into a turd, they generally would not pay as much as someone who was buying it for the automation. So I will not tear out the automation, but rather hope someone loves it and pays top dollar... After I am paid, they can burn it down, I don't care =)
Vaughn
Have you ever watched any of the "Sell you house" shows on A&E or HGTV? Watching from a point of having no attachment to these houses, I am amazed at what some of these sellers resist when it comes to selling their home. Some will fight these designers tooth and nail to paint over the fuschia kitchen because they love it. Once you put that sign in the yard, you need to do whatever it takes to make your house as appealing to as many buyers as possible.
When I go to sell my house, I plan on listing it with the Lutron lighting and the Crestron system (Not a full blown system, but it controls whole-house audio, stats, lighting and security(at least it will soon)) included. If after a set period of time, I will take it all out and reduce the price. I will have separated myself from the house and will do whatever it takes to sell it.
Unlike IVB and others in high demand markets, average TOM in my bracket is about 6 months, so if your house has "features" that could repel buyers, they will just go on to the next property.
Michael McSharry
Active Member
I had run speaker wire under the the last house I sold and the inspector commented that it was present. A condition of sale became that I remove the custom wiring. My take on this is that 95% of the home buyers do not want "features" that they see only as potential liabilities that could cost them more to fix or cause them problems.
ver0776
Active Member
This is sad news to me. I want to see every house automated. To hear that automating a house is equivalent to stapling black plastic on the walls for decoration is sad indeed.
I thought making a home smart was, well smart... I am not giving up, the world needs to be changed and I am not going to let some peoples fear of speaker wire stop my quest. =) What kind of home owner would consider a couple speaker wires a risk? you know 2 months after they move in they will be like "Wouldn't it be nice if we had rear speakers for our theater system?" "But honey, you had me make them rip them all out...."
Watch "Holmes on homes" It is a great show about how contractors and inspectors rip people of with bad work and destroy their lives. Maybe focusing on stupid crap like a speaker wire distracts the buyers from the bad electrical, plumbing, foundation... My god people have worse thing to worry about than where a speaker wire runs.
Vaughn
Let me preface with "I'm not knocking home inspectors."
I would recommend everyone purchasing house use one.
OTOH, my wife builds custom homes and she does a good job, but when you pay someone to inspect your house there is an expectation for them to find SOMETHING, or they are not doing the job.
Mine son just sold his house, one that my wife built. The home inspector wrote two corrections, "Bent flashing" and "Uncovered wire". We had to call the inspector about the flashing as we couldn't find it. It was over a direct-vent fire place and was done per manufactures spec. The uncovered wire was a spare RG6 I left in the crawl. The home inspector said it needed to be terminated in a box. Our electrician had to send them a letter stating it was LV and perfectly safe and typical to leave it the way it was.
The problem comes when someone frightens the new/perspective homeowner without warrant. Lot's of people think wire=electricity=shock/fire. Maybe the inspector should be telling them: "They left some unterminated wire in your crawl, it's not a wire for powering something in your house, maybe they were planning ahead, ask the homeowner what it's for"
Or maybe the inspector really doesn't know and has to cover himself....
Brian
I would recommend everyone purchasing house use one.
OTOH, my wife builds custom homes and she does a good job, but when you pay someone to inspect your house there is an expectation for them to find SOMETHING, or they are not doing the job.
Mine son just sold his house, one that my wife built. The home inspector wrote two corrections, "Bent flashing" and "Uncovered wire". We had to call the inspector about the flashing as we couldn't find it. It was over a direct-vent fire place and was done per manufactures spec. The uncovered wire was a spare RG6 I left in the crawl. The home inspector said it needed to be terminated in a box. Our electrician had to send them a letter stating it was LV and perfectly safe and typical to leave it the way it was.
The problem comes when someone frightens the new/perspective homeowner without warrant. Lot's of people think wire=electricity=shock/fire. Maybe the inspector should be telling them: "They left some unterminated wire in your crawl, it's not a wire for powering something in your house, maybe they were planning ahead, ask the homeowner what it's for"
Or maybe the inspector really doesn't know and has to cover himself....
Brian
When I sold my last house, the people buying specifically commented that they liked having all the wiring available (everything was centrally run to a closet). I had pulled all the automation out (not really automation - mostly audio, video, and IR) - but left wiring and security. In the end, it helped differentiate our house and we sold quickly.
Our current house - I have way too much automation in it to easily pull it out. However, my automation system is extremely adapted to our lifestyle. If I was to sell, I think I would "dumb-down" the automation system to very basic, very repeatable routines that work regardless of the owner (lights turn off when owners not home and it's daylight out, etc.). If the new owners want it to match their lifestyle - they can either learn how to program it themselves, hire a company to do it, or pay me to do it for them.
I know my automation would differentiate our house... will it help it sell for more money or faster??? I don't know. However I'm automating it with the plan that I'm never moving... and hope I don't
Our current house - I have way too much automation in it to easily pull it out. However, my automation system is extremely adapted to our lifestyle. If I was to sell, I think I would "dumb-down" the automation system to very basic, very repeatable routines that work regardless of the owner (lights turn off when owners not home and it's daylight out, etc.). If the new owners want it to match their lifestyle - they can either learn how to program it themselves, hire a company to do it, or pay me to do it for them.
I know my automation would differentiate our house... will it help it sell for more money or faster??? I don't know. However I'm automating it with the plan that I'm never moving... and hope I don't
Dean Roddey
Senior Member
I would think that you would just take CQC with you. Even if you had a Crestron system, the 'software' component of that system may not be of any real interest to the new buyers if it's been pretty heavily customized to your lifestyle. I'd think that automation hardware infrastructure is where the resell value is mostly, and that you'd take the software with you to start the new place. You could just leave the basic hardware based stuff in place for the new home owner and make them aware of how it can be highly customized if they want to do that. I.e. the lighting system is standalone system and only the fancy stuff would depend on the software, fancy stuff that you like but they might not. Same with the HVAC and so forth.
Hey, for that matter, make some more money by becoming their installer and have them pay you to set it up for what they want
Ranger Digital
Active Member
Vaughn, it sounds like you may be in a better position than most sellers. If you can afford to be picky about who buys it, then go with your gut and hold out.
It an envious position you hold to many. Most, when they want to sell, NEED to sell. Be happy you are in a position to hold out. GREAT!
In the rental market that is KEY to success, getting the right "renter" and holding out. Rarely are people in a position to hold out for the right "buyer", lol. good for you.
Personally, I couldnt care less if my buyer wanted to rip everything out, dog it, spit on it, whatever if the price was right, who cares! LOL SHOW ME DA MONEY!
It an envious position you hold to many. Most, when they want to sell, NEED to sell. Be happy you are in a position to hold out. GREAT!
In the rental market that is KEY to success, getting the right "renter" and holding out. Rarely are people in a position to hold out for the right "buyer", lol. good for you.
Personally, I couldnt care less if my buyer wanted to rip everything out, dog it, spit on it, whatever if the price was right, who cares! LOL SHOW ME DA MONEY!
Apples and oranges.
CQC is programming software that can be used at another location. The Crestron "project" is a compiled version that becomes almost like firmware. It can only be used on that processor in that project. If you have the uncomplied version, it can be modified by any Crestron programmer (or anyone who has the software and knows what they are doing for that matter) to fit your lifestyle.
damage
Senior Member
a friend of mine bought a house in Palo Alto, CA, gutted it, wired it, put in a lutron lighting system, caddx nx8e, controlled everything w/ misterhouse on a linux server, even had 3com audreys all over the place (this was in 2000) and security cameras feeding into another linux box running motion. he sold it about 4 years later to a couple who wanted EVERYTHING in the house, the audreys, the plasma tvs, the security cameras, the servers, etc. it didn't hurt that the buyers were both software engineers. they asked for a walk through of the code and how everything fit together. this is more the exception than the rule even though this is in silicon valley.
damage
Senior Member
come over to this side of the bay. facebook is looking like the next big thing since google http://gigaom.com/2007/07/13/facebook-ipo-fact-or-fiction
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