How reliable is Home Monitoring?

I have quite a few cameras and other home control devices. But I’m primarily interested in the Home Monitoring. I have been paying $47/mo, for almost 10 years for my current system. I finally came to the point where I said, “paying for what”? Originally I rationalized that it was because I was paying off the equipment they “supposedly” gave me for free. But that has long sense been paid off.

But the Home Monitoring used by Wyze, if 10 times less cost. So now I’m wondering how good it really is. I have been in test mode for over a month. I have been testing my system, along side my old system, to make sure I’m detecting and not generating false alarms.

It’s about time to go live, I don’t really need monitoring, because I get alerts to my phone and can call the police myself, but at such a low cost, it might be a good idea.

My system is simple:

  • Sensors on all external doors (x3)
  • Sensors on all internal doors (x7)
  • Motion sensors in rooms but master bedroom, on all hallways, and stairs (x8)
  • Camera in all rooms but bathrooms (x7)
  • External cameras covering all sides of my home (x4)

Not all sensors are installed yet. Hope the system can handle these. I don’t need the cameras to do anything but record. But I think I can create a rule to turn on a camera siren, if any door to that room is opened, when armed.

So, regardless of how someone might enter my home, they will trip at least 2 sensors. Any entrance through a window, puts them in a room with a motion sensor, and a door sensor to get out of that room. So it’s pretty easy to just open a camera and see what’s going on.

How reliable is Home Monitoring?

You should scan the forum for Home Monitoring System, HMS, Hub, etc. Then you can make your own decision.

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I am not that confident in my own reaction time to my own phone notifications. There are times when I am away from home with my phone on vibrate or DND. There are others when I have little to no reception. And, I don’t take my phone into the pool, the sauna, or the shower.

I have notifications set, but there were are times when an alarm is tripped when Noonlight was texting me and calling me before the notification got to me. Remember that notifications are subject to network congestion and carrier throttling.

Yes and no. Sensors can trigger a cam siren, but this trigger IS NOT a part of the HMS. The Disarmed\Home\Away state of the HMS CANNOT be used as a trigger. Sensors can trigger the HMS to alarm, or rules to action, but the HMS cannot trigger rules to action.

So, arming, disarming, or home state will not enable any rules for triggers to activate cams or cam sirens. Cam siren triggers must be programmed as a rule independently of the HMS in the rules section for that sensor specifically which means they would need enabled and disabled independently of your arming status.

With the number of internal sensors you have, just wanted to be sure you also knew the HMS also has no zone control. You get to assign your on duty sensors for Home and Away and that’s all.

As for the reliability, the HMS does it’s job and works as designed when it is supposed to. Noonlight response time is incredible. They are the best part of the HMS. And, it is really reassuring to have a silent panic button on the keypads and the app. I have been fortunate that firmware upgrades haven’t affected me too bad, but I wait until I get solid positive feedback from the forum before I update

Because all the sensors are on RF and not WiFi, there is no issue with network collision or WiFi loss between the sensor and hub. I was concerned with power failure issues since that would render the system useless since my fiber gateway, router and HMS Hub would be dead and without internet there would be no alarm alert. While the HMS Hub does have a resident battery backup, my router and gateway do not. I remedied this by installing a quite beefy UPS to run all my core devices.

Hope this helps!