I've had a revelation

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Ladies and gentlemen,

I've had a revelation. Thus says GeogeCastanza:

Home automation does not save any time, at ALL. It is a blackhole. It sucks time right off of you.

I do kind of enjoy it though.

  • Revelation may have been induced by a few red wines.
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Wiser words were never spoken.:rofl:

...and every black hole has another one waiting on the other side.

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But It’s a little cheaper than owning a boat. :joy:

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Actually, I've spent more than the cost of my boat on HA :slight_smile:
(cheap boat)

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I don't think automation was ever meant to save time or money... It was meant to make things more convenient or more consistent. Which it does in spades.

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I daren't count the cost, or I may have to fess up to SWMBO. At least you dont get wet :+1:

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LOL. Good one.

Oh by the way, we're also spending more money on turning off lights automatically then it would cost us to just leave LED lights running 24/7 :crazy_face:

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So I would have to disagree with saved anything. My home automation has reduced my power consumption from 2400KWh/mo to 1325KWh/mo. About a $120/mo savings on electricity.

But yes....HUGE time suck. The only thing that takes more time than home automation is my Jeep. Lol!

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It's a LOT cheaper than owning a boat....I spent less on all my HA stuff than I do just for my yearly slip and storage fees for my boat...let alone the boat...

now...to put another HE hub on the boat.....LOL (actually I would do this in a hot seconds but mostly for remote alerts, problem being the internet at the club is HORRIFIC)

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You must not have a house of LED lights, but rather a lot of tungsten filaments. Either that or you have a massive amount of LED lights running frequently.

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Same here, I went from 2500kw to around 1800kw (summer) and from 1800kw to 900kw (winter)

Mine was my old "dumb" thermostat cycled my A/C 260 times in a 24 hour period by cycling every 1/2 degree, Run for 8 minutes Off for 2 minutes. Replace with an ecobee, which has threshold settings so that when the a/c turns on it must stay on a minimum of 20 minutes and when off stay off for 15 minutes, plus setting a 2 degree trigger, now it cycles about 60 times per day .

Also older appliances. I had 13 cu ft (20+ years old) deep freeze that used 260 watts when on, replaced with a 24.8 cu ft one that uses 107 watts when on.

Televisions that used 265 watts when on with ones that use 76 watts.

Electric hot water heater controller that shuts off the hot water heater from 9pm to 7am everyday.

A smart plug on the Bunn coffee maker that doesn't keep the water heated all day long but turns on by time of day rule.

And the last minor thing was replaced a few bulbs with LED.

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But that's my point. These are the only two "Home Automation" savings. And if you don't have central A/C, there's little electricity savings from a thermostat unless it's controlling Electric heaters (which most smart thermostats cannot).

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I somewhat agree the "energy monitoring" provided by home automation that provided the information needed to make the changes isn't really "automation" but with replacing the TV's I now automate the TV's to only come on when motion is detected in the rooms and off when there is none instead of on 24/7. Which wasn't possible from the older TV's, so that adds to the savings.

And with the Thermostat I'm able to have it automatically turn off if a door or window is open over 2 minutes, which the dumb thermostat could not do. And with the HBFC's now on the fans they are automated by temperature to control what speed the fan is on thereby helping the A/C runtime.

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Hey I'm all for the improvements, and it's a good excuse to buy new toys too. The story for our spouses remains. We ARE saving money! We just omit the part about spending more on HA toys than we're saving in the long run :wink:

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With the $100 per month savings on the electric bill, it will be less than 2 years for the return on investment costs of replacing everything.

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They say the definition of a boat is a hole in the water into which you pour money. I think the definition of HA is a (w)hole lot of trouble into which we pour money. And both are kinda enjoyable in their own way lol :smile:

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BOAT is an acronym for

Break Out Another Thousand

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Ha ha ha, so so true.

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Hey... I'm retired... I need to have a hobby!

Yeah... that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

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Hey if she can say she saved us 30% buying something we have no need for then I am good too with all of my electric savings. Lol!

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