Any real estate agent will emphasise the importance of good lighting to add value to your home and in 2018 thanks to the integration of smart technologies, lighting has never been more impressive. There are many ways to turn your home into a smart home and add value to it when it comes time to sell.
Discover the most exciting smart lighting devices and bulbs which add instant value to your home.
Philips Hue bulbs
Philips have created one of the best smart lighting systems thanks to their early entrance into the market, making Philips Hue easily compatible with countless smart systems.
Working with everything from voice commands to Alexa and Siri when tethered to Philips Hue Bridge 2.0, you can create colourful lighting displays that change with the time of day, your mood, or when they sense movement.
If colourful lights sound too extreme, Philips Hue White and Hue White Ambiance may be more your style.
When using IFTTT systems (if this then that), Hue can be integrated with any smart device.
Hue can work with smart locks to illuminate your front step when you unlock your front door, turn bright when you receive an urgent email from your boss, or blink when you miss a phone call.
LIFX + A19 with Night Vision
Melbourne-based smart lighting genius LIFX have created smart light bulbs and products that offer supercharged brightness with a small carbon footprint thanks to a life span of 22 years and minimal power needs.
With an output of 1100 lumens and burning just 11 watts at full brightness, you can use the simple LIFX app to program this bulb to work with different devices, voice commands and with your security cameras.
Even more impressive; the LIFX + range emits an invisible infrared light at night allowing your security cameras to access areas of your home that would previously have been blind spots.
Ikea Smart Lighting
Thanks to Ikea, there is a smart lighting option for the budget conscious.
With Ikea’s Smart bulbs, which start from as low as $23, you can create your own smart lighting system controlled by the Ikea app on your smart phone.
Dim and brighten lights, adjust lighting colours according to your mood and adjust colour temperature.
While the functionality isn’t as advanced as LIFX, the affordability of the Ikea Smart lighting kits makes it a fun way to enter the smart lighting world.
GE Sol’s smart light with in-built Amazon Alexa
Imagine opening your eyes as your smart light illuminates your room, then beginning your day with the latest news and weather, thanks to that very same device?
GE Sol is both a smart light and a ‘home assistant’ thanks to the GE inventors who cleverly disguised Amazon Alexa inside the appliance.
With two LED rings of light, the Sol is both stunning and energy efficient as an ambient room lamp. The rings of light change colour depending on Sol’s function: The inner ring glows blue when Alexa is listening to you and spins when Sol powers up.
While the speaker is small in the Sol and the light isn’t enough to illuminate a whole room, the sleek design and integration with Alexa makes the device the perfect bedside or side table addition.
Nanoleaf Rhythm LED panels
Nanoleaf’s LED triangular panels pulse and move with music, movement or pre-programmed settings to add incredible energy to any room.
Initially, Nanoleaf LED panels were like other smart lighting products until the Rhythm Edition Smart Kit which includes panels with in-built sound sensors that detect nearby audio and light up to the beat.
Most impressive about the Nanoleaf LED is the depth of colour of the panels, making Nanoleaf known as ‘living paint.’
The attractive triangular shapes are more aesthetically pleasing than many of the smart lighting tiles available and allow you to create stylish geometric installations.
As interest in smart home technology continues to grow, the value of smart homes will effectively increase with it.
Not only is smart lighting both fun and functional, it’s a clever way to add value to your house or investment property.
