Selling your smart home? Here’s what you should, and shouldn’t, leave behind

On our most recent IoT Podcast, Rodney called in and left a question on our voicemail hotline. He’s thinking about selling his home and is wondering what smart home devices he should include with the sale. Both Stacey and I have sold our homes fairly recently, so we’ve already had to deal with this situation.

In Stacey’s case, she removed all of her smart light bulbs but left any of the wired smart switches as well as any other devices installed in the walls. In fact, since she had several brands of light switches wired up in the old house for testing purposes, Stacey actually replaced a few of them in order to have all of the switches in the home from a single brand. That was Lutron in her case.

This also meant leaving two connected thermostats, a smart garage door opener behind and the Alexa-controlled smart water dispenser for her kitchen sink. The latter item is surely something that buyers will remember about the home, possibly helping to sell it when the whole smart home story is told. Also left behind were the smart shades, partially to continue that story and partially because the shades were custom fit to the home’s windows. The chance of reusing all of them again in a new home are pretty slim.

Stacey left the smart doorbell and locks installed as well, but in this particular case, the eventual buyer wanted to replace all of those anyway. I can understand that: It’s the same reason you typically change the front door locks on a new home: You don’t want the old owner or their friends to have access.

My move was a little easier to prepare for as I don’t have any smart switches installed. Instead, my lighting is comprised solely of smart bulbs, which are less expensive, not to mention easier to install and remove. I also left behind my one connected thermostat.

Although it’s easy to leave connected cameras behind, I took mine with me for a few reasons. For one thing, I wanted them in my new home and didn’t want to invest more money in security-focused devices. Secondly, I don’t think a buyer would be comfortable using someone else’s webcams as they may always wonder if I could still peek in on the home. I wouldn’t of course, but I didn’t want that perception to become a negative thought against my home when it came to finding a buyer.

We also recommend complete factory resetting of any devices you leave behind from the sale of your home. That’s for your own peace of mind as well as that of the buyer. And another nice touch: Leave printed manuals for the smart home devices you include with the home sale so that the new homeowner can set everything up with a minimal amount of fuss.

To hear Rodney’s question in full, as well as our discussion, tune in to the IoT Podcast below: