Smart switches and locks for new construction

i'll only offer that i'm done with the whole mess i have

my wife repeatedly moves lamps with zigbee bulbs around the house which breaks the MESH because you have to 'pair zigbee in place' for it to network properly. she and the kids also flip the can lights on and off too many times in a row causing them to reset from the wifi network and pretty much any 3-way switch is a lost cause if you don't buy a 'slave' switch because once power is cut to the smart switch from the other switch its dead.

also the novelty of colored bulbs has worn off. tunable-and-dimmable-white i'm definitely down with but color is really not something you'll use much except in novelty locations.

you're right to avoid hubs. all of 'em. nothing good will come from constant tinkering with a hub.

at the end of the day, most of my stuff is automated through my alexa app; except for the more complex integrations. it gets to be a pain wondering where you set up an automation routine when there's more than one location but given how most devices now have their own apps with an alexa skill its just much easier to group things there because EVERYTHING is there.

speaking of which, not sure alexa is going to make the move with us. she is the digital version of that annoying person laying on the couch ringing a bell for service. my wife is forever announcing to all the dots in the house from the shower "hey can you check our son's chicken nuggets?" "hey can you bring me the shower scrub" "hey would you let the dogs out" "hey i need you to go down to my car and grab my purse"

i'm like a pavlov dog that cringes everytime i hear alexa say "announcing". it always means have to get off my arse and do something. she gets it from our 7 year old too though "mommy come here" is probably announced 173+ times a day.

but yep its super convenient to tell alexa to shut off all your lights if you're going to bed early and have her automatically close the garage doors & lock up the house every evening but of course, this comes with the price of jeff bezos sitting in front of a wall of monitors where he knows what every single person in the united states is really doing.

to recap; if i was single my home automation would be a thing of beauty and convenience. but having a wife and kids means its nothing but a hassle all the time. nothing i set up stays fixed for long. i've probably renamed the same bulb 15 times in the last 5 years.

my advice; get whatever the newest smart lock is that is from a well known company (not some fly-by-night company that will be gone in a year) and put in a few WiFi switches.

AND STAY OFF MY LAWN

We just installed a bunch of Legrand smart switches and while they were hard to get running at first, they have worked well. The main issue was getting them set up on a 2.4GHZ network, so I just made a dedicated network for them only. They work great with HomeKit, and they sell others that support Alexa and Google Home.

In addition to these, I have some LIFX bulbs for lamps that work great. No hub needed and they are relatively stable once connected.

Also, we have a Level smart lock, which I believe was made by the company who came out with August Lock. Its a smart deadbolt that replaces your existing deadbolt, so no keypad or anything exterior.

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you're right to avoid hubs. all of 'em. nothing good will come from constant tinkering with a hub.

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talk about yelling in at the clouds.... you stay in the clouds without hubs.

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you stay in the clouds without hubs.

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not true; i'm using hubitat and its local but its only as good as the most recent firmware update and local control hasn't lived up to the billing (at least for me)

I'm building a new house and I'll be adding the Ring cameras, doorbells, Level Lock and Lutron light switches as you can connect them all thru the ring app. I hate having to use 2 different apps now.

Not sure if it matters but I’m leaning towards nest for doorbell and outdoor cameras over Ring. Nest thermostats as well.

It would be nice to control everything in one app.

I forgot about the pico remotes. I had a light that has no switch. I pushed a whole caseta switch into the ceiling hooked to the light and put the pico remote on the wall.

I hated my initial set up due to the fact that the wife and kids would turn off switches and ruin any kind of automation or Alexa integration that was set up. I’ve switched over to Zooz switches and solved that problem. You can use the physical switch and not affect the usefulness of the “smartness”, ie you can physically hit the switch to turn a light off then tell Alexa to turn it on and it’ll turn on. Not sure if all switches work that way now but when I started down this path years ago if you physically turned a light switch off it was completely useless until you physically turned it back on.
And I use Hubitat and love it, have it integrated with Sharptools and can get pretty complex with automations.

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i'm using hubitat

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so you are using a hub....

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so you are using a hub....

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Yes, OP didn't completely rule out hubs, just said preferably no hub. I think something like a Hubitat is well worth the small cost and can easily be set up with minimal tinkering but can really expand what smart tech can be used and what it can do.