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Smart Home Costs: What to Budget for Home Technology
Home technology can easily be tailored to suit the depth of your pockets. You might be after easier heating and lighting controls, a way to keep an eye on the house while you’re away or a cinema setup for family film nights.
The right solution might start with a £20 app-controlled lightbulb that can be turned on or off remotely. And it could reach somewhere around the £100,000 mark for a completely integrated smart home system where everything is centrally controlled, from security to media streaming, with tip-top audio-visual equipment to boot.
Smart home budgets at a glance
Beyond individual gadgets, smart home technology can bring lighting, heating, security and entertainment together, allowing you to manage several rooms from shared controls. The cost depends on how much of the house you want to cover and the equipment you choose.
These indicative examples from CEDIA, the home technology trade body, show what different budgets could provide:
| Budget | What it could include |
|---|---|
| £15,000 | Wired and Wi-Fi infrastructure; music in several rooms. |
| £50,000 | Music and television in several rooms, plus mood lighting and more comprehensive networking. |
| £90,000 | Higher-quality equipment and shared controls for lighting, entertainment and heating throughout the house. |
| £150,000 | Additional touchscreens, more extensive systems and a higher-specification home cinema. |
Jump to Explore these smart home budget examples in more detail
Entry-level home technology for smaller budgets
For smaller budgets, or if a renovation project doesn’t involve extensive electrical works, wireless and plug-in consumer products can be a great option.
“These are designed to enhance the efficiency of your home, saving time and energy while enabling you to set scenarios for your daily routines,” says Katrina Mills, smart home buyer at John Lewis & Partners.
Popular starter options include the voice-activated Google Nest Hub and Amazon Echo, both of which can act as the base control for compatible products around the house – from Philips Hue lightbulbs to video doorbells. Alongside playing music and providing reminders, these devices give you a way to start improving how your home works for you.
Google Nest Thermostat E, available from Argos, offers app-controlled heating. It’s compatible with Google Home and Amazon Alexa, but not natively through Apple HomeKit
Smart speakers can be paired effectively with compatible thermostats, such as Hive or your heat pump control, so you can ask for the heating to be turned up without leaving the sofa.
New products are coming along all the time, but compatibility is sometimes an issue, so check they will work with the systems you’ve selected.
Katrina’s advice on an entry-level setup is to “start with lighting, heating and home security, as these tend to be the most beneficial categories in a smart home. There are enough products out there to see tangible results.”
You don’t have to do it all at once, either. “You can add new elements as and when you’re ready, allowing you to get to grips with each product as you go,” she says.
Trivselhus worked with interior design firm New i.d to install Apple HomeKit-compatible products at Sommar Place, bringing domestic and entertainment controls together
Smart home control is becoming the norm. Bespoke package house builder WeberHaus, for instance, has teamed up with Apple HomeKit to enhance your experience in the finished property.
Swedish firm Trivselhus used the same platform at its Sommar Place development in Milton Keynes – using compatible products to bring together lighting, heating, window blinds, security, audio-visual and domestic appliances in one eco system.
Integrated smart home systems
If you are self building or undertaking a substantial renovation, it could be a wasted opportunity to rely only on plug-and-play products.
If you’re wiring a home from scratch, the benefits of an integrated system are compelling and definitely worth considering whilst you have the chance.
“The important thing is making sure the cabling is done in a way that allows you to be flexible,” says Andy Mack, director of Cyberhomes. “If everything is star-wired back to a central position, that’ll give you the ability to do almost anything with the infrastructure in the future.”
An integrated system can control features individually, from heating valves to ceiling lights. It can also group elements together – so, when you leave the house, a single ‘all off’ button can turn down the thermostat, close the curtains, set the alarm and put the lights on security simulation mode.
Niko wall controls can bring several lighting circuits together into a scene, allowing you to select the combination you want with a single button press
Enhanced automation can make daily routines easier, save energy and improve your everyday experience of the home. Importantly, it doesn’t have to come at a cost to simplicity and intuitiveness.
Take lighting: wall controls remain part of the setup, alongside smartphone and central touchscreens, so walking into a room and turning the lights on still feels totally natural.
What’s different is that a single button press can operate multiple circuits to create different moods – for instance, in an open-plan kitchen-diner you might have one combination for cooking, another for eating and a third for relaxing. This can also mean fewer switch plates and less cabling to the wall controls.
If you’re worried that all this might be expensive, it doesn’t have to be. Much of the cost of a smart home lies in hardware you choose, such as AV equipment. Getting the cabling in place is actually relatively cheap during the building phase – in fact, a smart home’s reduced wiring and switching demands versus traditional electrics can mean there’s very little uplift in infrastructure costs.
So, install your infrastructure with expansion in mind. “If, for example, you’d like in-ceiling speakers but can’t afford it, pull in a cable now, mark on the drawings where it is, and at a later date you can cut a hole and the cable’s there ready for it,” says Andy Moss, managing director of Moss Technical.
Smart home savings
If you’re tackling a self build or major renovation, now’s the time to look at integrating smart home systems. But if the quote comes back and it’s outside of your budget, where can you do a bit of value engineering?
“Think carefully about the key rooms,” says Cyberhomes’ Andy Mack. “Do you really need full lighting and control in a secondary bedroom? Breaking it down so it doesn’t serve as many areas can have a big impact on costs.”
Andy Moss says that self builders sometimes decide just to service the ground floor, where there’s often a more concentrated need for smart tech (for example to integrate entry systems, lighting and blind controls, run underfloor heating systems or make the most of a media room).
Need expert advice on smart home tech options?Talk to industry experts about your plans and learn from their years of experience at Build It Live. Watch live presentations on a variety of self build and renovation topics, browse thousands of home technology products and get your specific questions answered. Build It Live takes place three times a year in Kent, Malvern and Exeter. The next show will be on 26th and 27th February 2027 in Maidstone, Kent. Claim a pair of free tickets today and start planning your visit. |
Matt Nimmons, managing director of CEDIA, suggests examining what best fits your lifestyle. “If you love watching movies or sport but don’t get a chance to go out to the cinema or to live sporting events, a home entertainment setup is a great investment and will give you a huge amount of pleasure over a number of years,” he says.
“If you travel a lot for work or relaxation, then having the ability to manage the house remotely and access its security features may be more important to you.”
Home technology specialists can be a little shy talking about costs in general terms because there are so many variables. “The only way to come up with a realistic budget is to get a design on the table and to understand the benefits of what it can do for you,” says Andy Moss.
Matt Nimmons’ suggested budgets below give a general idea of what you might expect to get for your cash. But deciding how you want to use the house is the first step, so a specialist can turn those ideas into a specification.
Getting the installation right is vital to achieving good value for money – so be sure you’re getting the best service. For instance, Moss Technical is able to work with your electrician on the design and fit, or suggest its own installers who are highly experienced in the Niko solution it offers.
Check out ongoing maintenance and servicing costs, too – these can be worth every penny, but it’s important to understand what you’re getting.
Case study Smarter family living
Peter and Katy Worthy replaced a 1950s bungalow in Surrey with a five-bedroom timber frame home, complete with smart technology geared to family life.
One morning button turns on CBBC in the playroom and the kitchen radio, opens the ground floor blinds and switches on the lights. In the children’s bedrooms, bedtime buttons set the lighting and music, which switch off after 45 minutes.
Ceiling speakers provide music throughout the house, while low-level bathroom LEDs come on automatically at night. The lounge doubles as a cinema, with a ceiling-mounted projector and Dolby Atmos sound.
The house also serves as a showcase for the couple’s company, Smarthomes, but Peter stopped short of installing every possible function. Keeping the system straightforward enough for everyone to operate was a priority.
“I’ve learnt over the years not to complicate things – after all, smart homes are intended to simplify your life,” says Peter.
Explore Peter & Katy’s Smart Home
The couple wanted a home with an open-plan layout and fully integrated smart technology
Smart home budgets
The size and layout of the property, along with the quality and quantity of equipment installed, will all affect the cost of an integrated smart-home system.
Here’s Matt Nimmons’ guide to what you could achieve for different budgets:
£15,000 Smart Home Budget
This would be sufficient for distributed or multi-room audio, a quality flat screen TV, and a basic wired and wireless data network. Additional functionality would cost extra. Remember that the number of rooms will affect the budget. Installing lots of screens will also quickly add cost.
Alternatively, this kind of budget could allow you to install high-quality sound and vision in a single room, creating a home cinema experience. At this level, you can expect a good setup in a medium-sized space.
£50,000 Smart Home Budget
Whole-house audio and video distribution, multiple flat screens, automatically controlled mood lighting in most rooms, and a comprehensive wired and wireless data network.
The amount and quality of the equipment will make a difference. Some people want large screens and good quality audio in every room, others would rather spend on aspects such as lighting, climate control, door entry, security and blinds.
Again, some homeowners might prefer simpler systems in the majority of the house, and to allocate a chunk of the budget to a home cinema.
£90,000 Smart Home Budget
At this level you can expect higher quality equipment and better control systems throughout the house. Touch panels in each room will allow you to have a fully integrated control setup for your lighting, entertainment and heating.
£150,000 Smart Home Budget
As above, with more touch panels, a better home cinema and more comprehensive systems. This kind of budget will provide a fabulous setup in a family home, but may not go so far in a 20-bedroom castle.
Browse Build It’s home technology directory to find companies offering smart home solutions – including heating and lighting controls, multi-room audio-visual, security and more.
Emily Brooks
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