Our homes are often jammed with technology, from home offices to big-screen televisions.
A new Ottawa housing development is the first of its kind in the city offering the newest generation of wired homes, including high-speed fiber optic connectivity.
Sohowest in Kanata has four builders creating a smart community of 1,200 homes. Buyers can choose how much technology they want and spend from $300 to $25,000 for extra amenities. Parrtners, from Rogers to Best Buy to Cisco, are bundling together the special technology packages.
Even at this early stage of sales, developer Will Karam says up to 60 per cent of buyers are interested in the tech features.
Smart homes are not new but the sophistication is rising rapidly. The Ottawa project is the first for the city and the second in Canada.
"The intersection of technology and real estate has been slowly coming for a long time and the people that we are working with were aware of that, and we are just nudging them in the right direction," Karam says.
All the wiring is done during construction, costs about $1,000, and is hidden from sight from the homeowner. All that's visible are extra control pads, switches, and wall plugs that can power everything from phones and cable to technology that pipes music throughout the house.
The home's main control panel is mounted on a wall on the main floor. The touch-sensitive, menu driven device allows the homeowner to operate everything from a security system, to the Internet, to jotting an electronic note, to checking the weather, to controlling the heat, pool, lights, and sprinkler system. They can also be accessed from far away though an online service.
The project also showcases the struggles between Bell and Rogers to see who delivers the goods. A big part of this new approach to homes is who gets to lay in the wiring. Rogers won the sohowest contract after promising one year of free home phone service to new residents.
Ottawa's Minto Homes posted a notice on its website when Bell refused to provide service for a development, allegedly in Barrhaven. Bell, Rogers, and Minto are all unwilling to discuss the issue, other than to say the market is competitive.
For consumers, the best advice is to ask their builder about which company's wires are in the ground, and what special offers are available.
"The builder should be up front with the information," says John Herbert, executive director of the Ottawa Home Builders Association. "The service suppliers are scrambling for business and dealing with ever-changing technology and with competition from a lot more players."
