5 Products to Heroically Protect Your Home

What home security products are worth your time? We hope this list of items that Wellesley Home Hero clients often love and recommend can help you better protect your home.

1. Home Security System with Professional Monitoring

While we of course hope that nobody ever breaks into your home and that you never experience a fire or carbon monoxide issues, planning ahead makes a real difference if they do. We recommend wireless home security systems like Amazon’s Ring not just for homeowners who don’t yet have professional monitoring, but also for homeowners who have a wired system but don’t realize that switching to wireless might both upgrade their technology and save them some money. Generally speaking, wireless products are more modern and the monthly service fees are more reasonable when compared with traditional wired systems.

No matter how you finalize your home security arrangement, you should take smoke and carbon monoxide detectors into consideration. We recommend wireless 2-in-1 Smoke and Carbon Monoxide detectors, with examples like Ring’s integrated First Alert Smoke / CO Alarm.

2. Smart Water Monitor with Automatic Shutoff

With a smart device that monitors your home’s water flow, you can stop both small and large plumbing issues before they cause damage. This might be the number one item that we think homeowners should have but don’t. A smart water monitor may have paid for itself when it finds a single leaky toilet or fixture, and we find that smart water monitors provide worthwhile protection, especially in a freeze-prone climate like Massachusetts.

One of the most trusted monitoring solutions that our favorite plumbers have repeatedly recommended is the WiFi-based Flo by Moen. The superpower for water monitors like Flo is detecting leaky fixtures that you might otherwise miss, such as toilet flapper issues or water filters with slow leaks. Both scenarios waste water and cause surprisingly painful water bills.

3. Water Leak Detectors

As you install a smart water monitor, you should also install multiple Smart Water Leak Detectors. Flo by Moen offers smart water detectors both directly and through sellers like Amazon, where they can sometimes be less expensive. The most powerful capability of water leak detectors comes from pairing with your smart water monitor, so you don’t just know about water in unwanted places, but also have your water main automatically shut off. This automation is exactly what you want if unwelcome leaks show up when you are not home, asleep, or otherwise not watching your phone.

We recommend putting one under your laundry machine and others near fixtures that might leak unexpectedly, like your hot water tank or your dishwasher.

4. Smart Deadbolt Keypad

A smart deadbolt keypad is as much for convenience as it is for security, but we’re including it since the end result for homeowners is better peace of mind. Once you’ve given access codes to trusted people, you've enabled your community to easily help you do routine maintenance tasks or securely bring in packages when you are not home. We recommend that our homeowners create distinct codes specifically for key household members like your Nanny or House Manager, as well as trusted friends, family members, regular service providers, and neighbors.

For homes with a compatible Z-Wave hub, including Ring's base station, we really like this Schlage Connect. Compared to WiFi-based keypads, Z-Wave's benefits include longer battery life, more reliable connectivity to the base, and a communication protocol that won't steal internet bandwidth from your other WiFi-devices. We also love the physical key slot, and find 30 unique access codes to be more than enough .

This specific lock has been hard to find online for years. For low “retail” prices, check out this somewhat-hidden page on Ring’s website as it often offers lower prices than Amazon’s main website.

5. Fire Rated Safe

Our customers often have sensitive hardcopy (paper!) documents that they both want to store at home and also protect in case of fire. Most frequently, these documents include estate plans, wills, and power of attorney forms where physical original paper copies are the most reliable when dealing with sensitive estate issues and the intended recipients are governments, lawyers, and banks who may have strict “paper original only” documentation requirements.

While other fire-rated safes offer more space or better protection from fire, we recommend this simple Document Safe since it offers basic protection at a lower cost than most other options and is lightweight enough for you or your local emergency response teams to extract it relatively easily if needed.

Going From “Should” to Done

While we hope that we’ve already saved you from doing some time-consuming research, we also know busy homeowners have a long way to go even when given a holistic list of recommended home products. Even “small” projects get blocked for months or years by time-consuming considerations like figuring out how to navigate insurance discounts, thinking through smart home integrations, and of course, finding and scheduling the right service providers. To receive our forthcoming post on how we recommend installing these products, be sure to subscribe to our blog. 

Disclosures

We do things differently at Wellesley Home Hero. This page does not contain any affiliate links and this article does not generate revenue by promoting specific products. Instead, Wellesley Home Hero always puts our homeowner’s best interests first. Accordingly, we earn revenue when busy Wellesley homeowners hire us directly. If you’re a Wellesley homeowner who wants to save time when better protecting your home, request an invite to Wellesley Home Hero’s private beta. We would love to help.