Buying real estate continues to be one of Australia’s favourite ways to invest. The goal of any investment property should be to increase the value – you want it to be worth more than when you brought it. But how do you add value to your investment property?

Finding ways to maximise the potential of your property can be a challenge for new investors. Fortunately, plenty can be done to add value – it just takes a little experience and a few top tips to know what you should be looking for.

Here are some helpful ways you can add to your property’s value with smart home technology, so when the time comes to rent it out or sell it, you can look forward to greater returns.

Get with the Trends

Smart Technology is Here to Stay

Technology has already transformed the way we live, work and play, so it’s only a matter of time until the same technology shift impacts the value of real estate as well. Technology has added an extra layer in the search for value when analysing the potential profit of a property. So while location, neighbourhood, size and floorplan are all essential factors, investors must consider ways to add value, differentiate themselves from competitors and find new ways to increase their bottom line through technology.

If your property has smart home technology, this can be extremely beneficial and add significant value to your market price. In fact, the latest Barclays Mortgages Digital Homes Report found that demand for homes fitted with technology such as smart air conditioning, high speed internet and energy use monitoring systems is rising. With nearly a third of homeowners believing that a property with connected technology is worth more than one without, it’s time to add smart technology to your property if you want to attract more buyers.

Energy Efficiency a Major Selling Point

So why smart products? Not only do they make life easier by allowing you to control the way your home runs wherever you are from your phone or tablet, they’re also extremely energy efficient.

“Energy efficient” was second only to “safe community” on the list of attributes that would most likely influence a purchase decision, according to a survey by the National Association of Home Builders. This shows how lowering your home’s energy costs is a major selling point nowadays and can add value and interest to your property.

Over time, every little bit of energy adds up. So homeowners will appreciate a property that has carefully considered costs in the long run and has come up with a readily available solution for them.

Currently, there are 7 key areas of growth in the digital home space, according to the Barclays report. See below our top 3 picks from the 7 for the smart home products homeowners will be looking out for.

Smart Home Products to Watch

Heating & Cooling

Out of all the technology in the home, heating and cooling was voted as the area homeowners would be most likely to have installed at the moment. The trend has been led over the last few years by the rise of smart thermostats, which allow you to adjust the temperature of your property through a simple mobile app.

Now, new devices in the market even allow you to change the temperature in individual rooms in the home. Advantage Air’s MyAir air conditioning management system comes with 10 zones and individual air flow control, allowing you to manage how much air each room receives.

For even more precise temperature control in certain rooms, you can also install an Individual Temperature Control (ITC) sensor to automatically adjust the airflow to your selected temperature, or motion sensors to detect when a room has been empty for a certain period of time.

The option to control the temperature in individual rooms is a must for investors, with zoning voted as the most popular feature homeowners look for when buying technology for their property.

Lighting

With the rise of the digital home, comes the rise of brighter lighting choices. Homeowners are looking for the latest innovations and want to get the most bang for their buck. Now thanks to smart lighting systems such as Advantage Air’s MyLights, they can.

MyLights allows you to enjoy the security, cost savings and comfort of being able to control all the lights in your home from your smart device. You can turn your lights on from anywhere – from the car so you always walk into a brightly lit home or even while on holiday so it always looks like you’re home.

You can also take comfort in knowing you’ve reduced your lighting energy consumption by up to 80% by making the switch to LEDs. Then, to save even more energy you can use the MyEco function to automatically dim all your lights. Homeowners will barely notice the difference in the room lighting, but they’ll see a big drop in their power bill.

Home Hubs

Whilst the aim of connected home devices is to make your life simpler, things can start to get confusing when you purchase multiple items that all use separate apps and logins to control them. That is where the home hub comes in handy. Connecting all the digital appliances in your home – from your air conditioning to your lighting – in one hub which can be accessed through one app will make life a lot easier.

With Advantage Air’s MyPlace, homeowners now have a dedicated tablet for the home. An 8-inch Internet smart home control panel, MyPlace allows you to control both MyAir and MyLights from the same place. In addition, the touch screen also doubles as an Android tablet that lets you keep track of the family’s calendar, check emails, order groceries, play music, play bills and much more.

Thinking of selling your home? It’s not too late to enhance your property with smart home technology. For more information on how to get the most out of your investment with Advantage Air’s MyAir or MyLights, contact us today.