Owning your own home

I was looking at the amazon blink. No subscription and runs on AA battery. Couldn’t find out if it works in my region though (Sweden)?

But a nest hello.

Don't bother with the subscription.

Set up email alerts, and then store those forever and you have infinite storage of visitors without a subscription.

We’ve got the Nest doorbell and after a year I decided to get a ‘10 day footage’ subscription, no regrets. It proved especially useful in settling an argument when my wife and I had our cars rifled through and I could rewind the days footage and prove it was her who left them both unlocked. Ahh the pettiness of married life.

I have six Arlo cameras dotted around the house and its perimeter. They work. I caught a burglar trying to break in and scared him off by switching the alarm on. Footage was sent to the police who had him locked up. I chose Arlo over Nest or Ring as the cameras are wireless (rechargeable batteries) but my neighbour went to the trouble of wiring in his Ring cameras and the image quality is definitely better. I would definitely go for a subscription of some sort.

£££ for Ubiquiti

I help my downstairs neighbour out with his Ubiquiti addiction (about 8 switches/APs, 6 cameras and even outdoor APs) and it's relatively sensible stuff.

(Although not sure whether they've cleaned up their act on Linux GPL which, if they haven't, isn't very ethical.)

(Although not sure whether they've cleaned up their act on Linux GPL which, if they haven't, isn't very ethical.)

This is probably the least ethical problem with all of the internet connected cameras.

Do you have an iPhone?
If so eufy.

@>>>>>>

I've just ordered a SimpliSafe bundle for the new house.

1 x Bamburgh Security System: 13 Components: £503.88 (~£300ish with the Black Friday deal)
1 x Auxiliary Siren
1 x Panic Button
1 x Yard Signs
2 x Window Decals
1 x Base Station (Cloud)
1 x Wireless Keypad (Cloud)
2 x Key Fob (Obsidian)
3 x Entry Sensor
2 x Motion Sensor
1 x Glassbreak Sensor
2 x SimpliCam 1080p

The cameras will be by the front and back door so not going for a video doorbell. I don't think their video doorbell is available in the UK yet anyway. £20 a month for their "pro" level monitoring, which can be dropped at any time.

Get a massive dog

Similar for me, just plumbing in cameras and so far it’s been pretty great.
The new system has apparently solved the instant hack as per lockpicklawyer

@lowbrows @stevo_com I have a Q on simplisafe, you might know the answer. Can you set different levels of cover? For example I want to have a motion sensor in the hallway, but don't want it turned on when I turn the alarm on at night, but do want it turned on when we leave the house? Is that possible?

There are five flats in our building. Building expenses are split 15/15/15/15/40 with the ground floor flat (converted from a shop) paying the 40%, which is written explicitly into the lease (and the 15% into everyone else's leases).

A couple of years back three of us leaseholders bought the freehold, excluding the ground floor flat owner. He's now being arsey and complaining he's on the hook for 40%, and withholding his portion of payment and questioning every expense and threatening to take us to tribunal. I think he's bluffing and would lose any legal action over the 40%, but he has real leverage in terms of refusing to pay service fees.

(I don't think it matters whether the 40% is fair or not, but it was in his lease for him to see when he bought it, and has been since 1987)

This is more of a Bastard Neighbours rant than a request for advice, but if anyone has any I'm all ears.

Fucking landlords.

"The SimpliSafe system comes with three modes: Off, Home, and Away. Setting the system to “Off” completely disarms it. The “Home” setting arms the system, but leaves out any motion sensors. The “Away” setting arms everything."

Hmmm, close! I have motion sensors in certain rooms that I would want to arm in "Home" mode, rooms where it is easier to do motion sensor than entry sensor, will have to rethink!

tell him you'll take him to court for failure to pay and see if that shuts him up?

A couple of years back three of us leaseholders bought the freehold, excluding the ground floor flat owner

How did you achieve that? Are you 100% sure that the deal to buy the freehold didn’t disturb the 40/15/15/15/15 deal somehow?

If he starts quibbling the charges you have to go to tribunal I suppose - as freeholder you will probably win as long as you followed procedure; in that case you can require him to pay your costs as well.

Ah ha, found the FAQ, that is the default setting, can change each sensor individually, that makes things easier!

Boom! I haven't actually set mine up yet as I haven't moved, just found the above from Google. As we are likely to be up and down in the night (young kid) I'll probably stick with the default.

Yes, I'm with you there. I was trying to use motion sensors in rooms we don't go in at night, so with a bit of tweaking I can make it work. Now to work out if the entry sensors will work on my stupidly profiled windows and doors.

Medium sized hypoallergenic, them's the rules in this house... You're as bad as Lori... Our neighbour has to put his down a few months back cuz it bit a DHL driver who just waltzed onto his property without thinking, dickhead... Ollie was a lovely dog...

I think I'm gonna get the Google outdoor cameras front and back and just stump up for the subscription, it's pretty cheap compared to a lot of the other systems I saw today... So many to choose from, bit bewildering... I want them to be plugged into the mains, can't be bothered with switching batteries, etc, a solar powered thing would be nice but wouldn't work for where they'll be sited on the house... My mate is getting me a discount at work so I'll do a bit more research before pulling the trigger... Thanks for the advice, all...

Are you one or two storey? Trying to work out whether to put entry sensors on upstairs windows, or just whack a motion sensor on the landing.

PM'd, not sharing more details than I already have on a public forum.

Yep, sorry, valid point.

Yep you can set up the different profiles for every sensor when you set up the system.

How did you achieve that? Are you 100% sure that the deal to buy the freehold didn’t disturb the 40/15/15/15/15 deal somehow?

We trusted an expensive solicitor to sort it all for us, so obviously they will have taken care of that...

If he starts quibbling the charges you have to go to tribunal I suppose - as freeholder you will probably win as long as you followed procedure; in that case you can require him to pay your costs as well.

Alas our charging regime has been a bit shambolic, so we might have a problem there.