DIYbanter - View Single Post

Jeff Thies

On 8/15/2010 8:34 AM, wrote:
On Aug 15, 12:05 am, "Ed wrote:
wrote

Are you the landlord or the tenant in this 900 s.f. house ?

If you are the tenant you will need to discuss this addition with your
landlord and obtain permission as the installer/dealer is going to
need consent from the property owner to install the control box and
phone dialer for central monitoring...

This type of system has no dealer or installer. It is plugged into the
phone nad there is an AC adapter for power. I don't see where the homeowner
needs to give consent for anything.

If you are the landlord don't be cheap about this... If you are
looking
to invest in your rental home and add an amenity then go through a
local alarm company dealer which will be around to service your
system in the future if something ever goes wrong with it...

Our alarm company charges $90 an hour for service. This entire system sell
for $93. Sure, it may not be quite as effective as a monitored system, but
a blasting siren solves most break-in problems.

I installed a wireless one back in the 80s made by Schlage in my
condo. Overall, it worked OK and served it's purpose. Except one
time it did malfunction while I was away on a business trip, set off
the siren, and failed to reset. After neighbors called me, I had to
get my cleaning lady to go over and cut the wires to the siren to stop
it.

If it's a property you are renting, you may need to get permission
from the landlord to install it. For example, how are you going to
mount window and door sensors?

A little background: I've come into a small inheritance (my brother
and myself took care of Mom in her house rather than a nursing home).

It's a great time to buy houses if you have cash, a bad time if you
don't. I have a house I just acquired with tenants (previous owner just
dropped 10K in improvements it, nicely done, my price 17K). Next week,
I'll be buying an unoccupied house. Good neighbors though.
In addition, I have my own house. I'd like to put an alarm in each.
I've looked at several and they seem to have similar to identical
features. I know a bit about electronics and most electronics are
designed using the same chips or chip families, the ergonomics are
different and the discreet component that "glue" it together are
different, but the core logic/functionality is identical. I'm thinking
this may be the case here.

I'm thinking one or two motion sensors and the door sensors. The
window sensors I think are a pain, and the motion detector should pick
it up. I think we are now in the wireless age and I'm down with not
crawling through a crawl space. These alarms seem to let you set rules
for different zones, so some may trip an alarm and some will just log
the intrusion.

But I have no actual experience with them...

Jeff