A staggering number of Americans (72 percent) say they would like the ability to monitor their home when they are gone -- with the majority looking to use the technology for safety and security purposes, such as monitoring who is in the house and knowing when their children arrived home safely from school.
This is one of the findings from a nationwide survey of 1,000 Americans conducted by the Z-Wave Alliance, a consortium of companies dedicated to establishing Z-Wave as the standard in wireless home control, in collaboration with Kelton Research. The survey findings point to growing consumer demand for wireless home control applications such as remote home monitoring to reduce energy consumption, increase safety and generally enhance comfort and convenience.
"Were still in the very early stage of wireless home control and there is a growing desire for Americans to be able to monitor and control their home remotely," said Mike Einstein, marketing chair for the Z-Wave Alliance. The challenge is that consumers still feel that home automation is a far-away concept that is only affordable to the very wealthy. The mass consumer is not interested in automating their home in the way we have traditionally viewed it. They are interested in solving real problems, in bite-sized pieces. Consumers are now able to do this thanks to technologies such as Z-Wave.
The survey delivered some additional findings that further support the growing demand for wireless home control and monitoring solutions including:
- Nearly two out of five Americans find themselves wondering if theyve left an appliance on or a door unlocked at least some of the time.
- More than half of all Americans would be able to relax on vacation if they were able to control things like their lights, home alarm system or appliances from anywhere in the world.
- Nearly half of all Americans would prefer to know more about who is in their home when they are not.
- Americans spend more than 24 hours every year turning off appliances and shutting down their homes before bed, which over the course of the average American lifespan is more than 77 days of your life!
- More than 1.5 million adult Americans worry that they are not as efficient as humanly possible when it comes to conserving energy by turning off lights, heat, air conditioning and other appliances.
- Parents are more than four time as likely to want the ability to remotely see if their children came home from school than to be able to remotely control their home security system.
"The biggest benefits for consumers are convenience and increased security," added Einstein. "With Z-Wave you can monitor an elderly relative living across the country, keep an eye on your vacation home during a storm, or simply make sure your young child returns home from school on time -- all from your office PC or cell phone."
This survey was conducted of a representative sample of 1,000 adult Americans between August 7 and August 15, 2006 via nationwide random digit dialing of both listed and unlisted numbers.
For more information, please send your e-mails to swm@infothe.com.
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