How to use your makeover to create a 'smart' home

Conversion is the ideal opportunity to rethink your four walls. You can finally change details that have plagued you for years but had to accept before. This will make your home look nicer and more modern, but you can go a step further and create a "smart" home. You can learn how it works in this article.

Comfortable smart life

Why Smart Home? A smart home is supposed to make your daily life easier and free you from processes. For example, you can automatically raise the blinds, turn on the lights and activate the sockets at a certain time in the morning. The use of technology does not make life more complicated, but more enjoyable.

First thing: plan

Before you start choosing your smart home gadgets at will, you should take a step back and integrate your smart home upgrades into your overall renovation plan.

You should define the following four points in your smart home planning:

• What do you expect from a smart home? First, focus on a few areas that are important to you, such as keyless access or energy savings.

• Create a separate budget for purchasing and installing smart home devices (if necessary). With 50 to 1,00 euros, you can already achieve a lot.

• As much as possible, estimate the extra work required to make your home smart.

• Adapt your smart home planning to your home. In a new building, there may be good basic wiring, or even a bus system that you can use. In older buildings, you should focus on battery-operated smart home devices or wireless smart home standards. If you live in a rented apartment, you should choose smart home devices that you can take with you to another home.

The Heart of the Project: Implementation

You can finally get started and get inspired by the possibilities a smart home offers you. If you're still not sure which smart home devices are right for your needs (e.g. Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa, etc.), our blog and a short Google search will help you. Early in the planning phase, you've thought about which elements of your smart home to start with. This makes selection easier and helps you focus on the essentials when faced with numerous options. You're just getting started, and after your first experience, you can always expand your smart home.

If you decide to use a smart home device that you can't install yourself, schedule an appointment with an expert or ask around in your circle of acquaintances. If you're doing a full renovation of your home, it's also possible that the specialists you need, such as an electrician, are already on site and available to support your project.

However, many smart home devices can be set up without much technical knowledge. For example, our airEkey smart locks can be installed in just three minutes - without outside help and without any drilling or screws.

With the airEkey smart lock, you can turn your smartphone into a key, open the door automatically (using automatic unlock) and control access remotely using a Wifi box (airEkey box). Electronic door locks also allow you to grant others digital access. You can send these "digital keys" via the airEkey app, set a time limit and delete them again at any time - all without making any structural changes to the existing door.

But if you're still installing a new front door, check out our smart doors.