How To Reduce, Reuse And Recycle Your Way To A Smart Home

Do you need to throw out your old home products to replace them with new smart home products?

Completely replacing older products in your home in favor of new smart products can be expensive, complicated and time-consuming.

For things that are supposed to make your life simpler, getting Smart Home products ready for your home can be anything but simple.

But did you know there are now retrofit Smart Home products that make your life a lot easier?

Wait up. Wait up. What is retrofit you ask? 

Retrofitting is to add on new features to older products, appliances, and things without having to replace them. 

For you, this means you can have a smart home without having to invest a stupid amount of money and time. Unless you are the 1% of the population that has the time and money to completely replace parts in their home, retrofit is easily the way to go.

… Still not convinced? Read on and I’ll give show you can reduce, reuse, and recycle your way to a smarter home.

Replacing is time consuming

Some smart home products like thermostats may have more functionality when they are completely replaced. 

The problem?

These products require complicated and time-consuming installation.

Routing cables through walls, ceilings and across the entire home takes a long time and there is a lot of room for error. And of course… there is always the risk of not getting the product to work in the end! 

Replacing is costly

If replacing your entire home with new technology is something you aren’t comfortable doing yourself, you can always hire installers. 

However, professional installation is a very expensive undertaking: Installers need to cut holes in your wall to make room for cabling.

Even if you are able to take care of the installation yourself, you are throwing out perfectly good products that you have already paid for.

What a waste! 

Replacing is wasteful

What you don't want to have to do is a forklift upgrade.

What does that even mean you ask? 

We've got you.

In this case, the system is your home. 

By simply throwing out all that old stuff you’re contributing to growing landfills and discarded electronics are particularly harmful to the environment.

If every home were to toss out their thermostats or old window shades in favor of technologically advanced and connected ones, poor ol’ Mother Nature is going to have quite the tummy ache!

Retrofit is simple

You don’t need to rebuild your house from the ground up to be on par with newer modern residences. With a simple add-on or small replacement, you get to completely avoid swapping out your trusty old home products. It’s always easier to put something on your wall rather than in them and it’s always simpler (and cheaper) to be able to do it yourself!

Motorized window shades, in particular, are notorious for complex installations from wiring to tubular motors that just look bizarre. With something like AXIS Gear, you can use the chain or cord already on your shade to make them motorized and connected.

Retrofit is stylish

How do you ask? 

Simple. You get to keep your style. 

Traditionally, if you like the functionality of smart home technologies but not the look, you were out of luck. Now you have the luxury of being able to buy the things you like and to make them smart later on, all by yourself.

You get to keep your individual style. Who wouldn’t when decorating your home is such a strong and personal statement of who you are. 

Retrofit allows you to harness the power of new technology without sacrificing the charm of your home.

Retrofit is environmentally friendly

Instead of having to throw out your entire fridge or set of window shades, you can simply upgrade it with a retrofit device to make it connected and upgraded. 

Your vanilla thermostat or shades have now evolved into cutting-edge equipment. 

Best of all? No waste and no harmful tummy ache for our pal Mother Nature.