I have always perceived setting up a smart home as a means of convenience, with some luxury added. At least, that’s what I thought a decade ago when I set out to automate my smart home. Today, a wide range of affordable to expensive smart home solutions involve even the most basic and budget components. Despite the evolving smart home platforms, protocols, and devices, I’m guilty of wasting several dollars and committing blunders while setting up my smart home. I hope that my mistakes save others from frustration, headaches, and overspending while setting up a smart home.

7 Selecting a smart home installation and ecosystem

Start small with a long-term plan

Professional smart home installations are expensive, but they save time. Like many, I got smitten by the plug-and-play videos of smart speakers. I purchased the first-generation Amazon Echo smart speaker, hoping to achieve a similar smart home setup. However, Google Home Hub, Echo speakers, and HomePods serve only as good starting points for basic voice-driven smart home control. Also, these platforms require connecting every device to cloud-based services to make automation work. Meanwhile, I valued more local control and keeping my data at home.

Ultimately, I overcame my obsession with investing heavily in a single big tech company’s smart home ecosystem. Although I had limited technical expertise, I evaluated Homey Pro and Hubitat smart home hubs to support a bevy of smart devices. But both are quite expensive and not easily available in my country. With a stripped-down budget, I braved towards an evolved yet flexible Do-It-Yourself path with Home Assistant OS on a Raspberry Pi. That’s because Home Assistant is an open-source smart home software that runs locally supports several protocols, integrates thousands of devices, and gives full control over privacy.

6 Buying too many smart home devices

Start small with an expansion plan

While wielding an Amazon Echo speaker, I splurged a lot on smart bulbs, smart plugs, and a few other gadgets without a proper plan. My idea was to get smarter endpoints (lights) that function with a few voice commands. After struggling with the wake words and voice commands, I switched to the Alexa app and eventually ended up using the smart lights as regular ones. When I started using smart devices like dumb ones, I didn’t see much incentive to buy more of them. I’m glad I didn’t invest in expensive smart appliances and gadgets. Looking back, I still paid a fair amount for several inexpensive smart devices because I didn’t have a long-term plan. Lately, I followed my XDA colleague, Adam Conway’s experience of setting up smart devices with a Zigbee dongle and managed to revive some of the legacy smart bulbs instead of buying new ones.

5 Leapfrogging the smart home hub necessity

Hub-less setup does only basic things

My first-generation Echo speaker didn’t work much to create concrete smart home plans. However, it did help me skip adding a dedicated Philips Hue bridge near my desk. The idea of using multi-room smart speakers and separate smart home hubs for different devices didn’t sit well with me. The Philips Hue smart lights did not work with my Apple TV 4K or HomePod without a Hue Bridge, which left me in a soup. I also tried using a couple of Bluetooth and Wi-Fi-enabled smart devices without a hub. However, they required dedicated apps and were often unreliable. After failing hard with a hub-less setup, I realized the importance of a good, multi-protocol smart home hub for improved reliability and faster automation responsiveness.

4 Ignoring the compatibility checks in smart home devices

Devices that don’t talk to each other easily

In my excitement about setting up a smart home, I completely overlooked the compatibility information on the product packages. It’s no wonder I couldn’t get many of the inexpensive smart plugs to work with my Echo smart speaker. Besides, the Philips Hue lights would not work with Apple TV 4K or HomePod without the setup code, which I had lost some time ago. Some smart plugs only worked on Wi-Fi, and even then, only with a Tuya or Smart Life app. Amidst the chaos of separate apps and smart devices from different brands, I realized that they didn’t work well together. But Home Assistant made it possible to bring most of my devices under one umbrella, allowing me to automate them.

3 Underestimating the network strengths and requirements

Overloading the 2.4GHz frequency band

Living in a moderately sized home, I estimated that an old router could easily handle several devices. As the volume of devices increased, they began disconnecting and disappearing from my humble 2.4GHz Wi-Fi band router. To remedy that, I purchased a dual-band Wi-Fi 6 router (ASUS RT-AX88U) for better coverage and to accommodate more devices. I transferred all the modern devices to the 5GHz band and decluttered the 2.4GHz band. The router provides decent coverage, but some corners still encounter weaker signals. Recently, I used a Zigbee dongle to manage a couple of bulbs using Zigbee2MQTT with an MQTT server in Home Assistant and found it to be more reliable than using them with a smart speaker. That made me realize that not every smart device needs a high-speed Wi-Fi network unless it’s a high-resolution camera.

2 Overlooking power requirements and placement

Pulling extension cords was making things ugly

I skipped installing thermostats or doorbells since they require extra electrical work across the house to pull wiring from a distant outlet. I had a tough time figuring out a proper placement for a clear field of view and network coverage. Additionally, the overall installation proved to be expensive and looked unattractive. Meanwhile, I piled up smart devices into power strips and extension cords across the house, making a few corners busier than others. That’s why I considered battery-operated alternatives, although they are relatively expensive and require buying batteries in bulk.

1 Skipping the usage approval from the family

Causing resistance, confusion, and chaos

My family straight up found the smart devices and automation quite irksome and annoying. I miscalculated their comfort and technical inclination towards smart home automation. That’s why most automations failed, as my family would turn off physical switches out of habit. Barely anyone used voice control because smart speakers struggled with their commands to operate a smart device. Frantic complaints about devices “staying on” and starting automatically piled up. Over time, my family's resistance to following automation and frustrations led me to limit the smart devices only to my room.

Building and maintaining a smart home takes time

All these mistakes taught me that building a smart home requires family involvement, thoughtful planning, and patience to research compatible smart devices. Learning about wireless protocol topologies can also help manage several smart devices in a home. That said, the classic ‘deploy and forget’ approach doesn’t work unless you opt for professional installation. Still, maintaining a smart home demands time to apply security and firmware updates, as well as setting strong passwords to prevent security lapses. You will encounter errors and may need to deal with some code for maintenance.

That said, taking regular backups of your setup can always help if things go south after any updates or tweaks. For easy installation and management of smart home devices, I look forward to wider adoption and support of the Matter standard. Of course, smart home automation can seem daunting, but the idea is not to go overboard.