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The ICON SMART Package: Staying in the forefront of the future.

Smart Package

Building a home is an endeavor that looks into the future. It’s one of the only things you’ll ever buy that will impact your life so profoundly and for the long term. It’s why there must be foresight involved, vision, and expertise on a variety of fronts—from structural and architectural integrity to functionality, aesthetics, to the everyday appliances.

When searching for a custom home builder, it’s important to know how they are using all of the tools available to them. As El Paso’s most successful custom home builder, one of the ways ICON Custom Builder stands out is our efforts to stay at the forefront of cutting-edge technologies that make life better.

In a previous post, we talked about how our homes are 100% spray foam insulated. Similarly, smart home technology is all the rage, but it’s not just about luxury or bragging rights. It’s not just about having sleek and cool-looking gadgets in your home. These technologies exist to adapt to the way of life of the modern family and make things better. Let’s take a look at some of the features available with our homes.

For Increased Energy Efficiency: The Nest Programmable Thermostat

Imagine a thermostat that knows things about you. It figures out when you go to work, when you come home, when you wake up, and it sets the temperature accordingly. In the past, people had roosters that announced the coming of dawn. Today—while you can certainly still have a rooster—you can wake up to the coziest temperature in the bedroom so that leaving those warm blankets is not such an arduous task.

This small ENERGY STAR certified apparatus of 3.3 inches in diameter and 1.8 inches thick is like an algorithm master; it uses artificial intelligence (AI) to learn about your house, how long it takes to warm up, what the weather is like, and how to better serve your HVAC system to help energy saving. The Nest Thermostat uses sensors and smart technology to program itself based on your daily patterns. The purpose of its learning and algorithms is so that it can better serve you and save you energy. With this thermostat, you can program your HVAC systems through your smartphone, control the temperature from inside or outside the house, and track changes. Other convenient features include:

  • The Airwave feature automatically gives your AC a break by kicking on the fan and helping circulate the cool air already in the home.
  • A Nest can detect when it’s being heated up in direct sunlight. The Sunblock feature will automatically adjust so the readings are not skewed.
  • The Cool to Dry feature kicks on the AC and reduces humidity in the air
  • The Early-On feature will figure out when to turn up the heat so that you can wake up to a cozy house.
  • Coupled with ICON’s spray foam insulation, this Nest thermostat achieves even more energy efficiency.

For Added Security and Monitoring: The Smart Doorbell

So you’re waiting for an important package to arrive but traffic was bad and you’re not going to make it home in time. If only there was a way that you could talk to the delivery person and let them know to leave the package behind the large plant. Wait, there is a way! Smart doorbells are much more than adding a novelty sound so you can hear Beethoven’s Fifth every time someone comes to your door.

Today, a smart doorbell can detect motion at your front door, send you notifications to your smartphone or PC, and even allows you to see and speak to visitors through the app. The Smart Doorbell provides extra security; it has caught criminals in action as they attempt to take packages or approach the home. The camera and microphone allow you to communicate directly to the person at your front door. You can even sync the Smart Doorbell to your security system. It’s a very nifty device that is included in ICON’s SMART Package.

For Added Security and Convenience: The Keyless Entry Deadbolt

Locking yourself out of your house, or carrying your house keys is a thing of the past. Or you can at least do it the modern way. Having a keyless lock on your front door can help with added security. A keyless entry deadbolt can lock and unlock your door through a four-digit code.

For the Technological Modern Family: Alexa or Google Home

How many of us recall seeing sci-fi movies in which we could control a home with just the sound of our voice? Each smart package includes either an Alexa or Google Home that can control these features or, how about asking your home for the weather, traffic or even grocery lists?

These modern times are exciting and integration with any of these devices are the basis for any modern Smart Home.

Reach Into the Future. Make Your Home an ICON.

Building a home is a multi-layered undertaking. It’s not done by just one person; it requires multiple hands, labor, expertise, and knowledge. ICON synthesizes all of these efforts into an easy process. This demands, however, that the home builder be well-versed in all of the different areas. ICON Homes is there every step of the way. Our SMART package is only one way we take our homes to the next level. Questions about our features? Give us a call!

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RESNET Energy smart builder

ICON Home Custom Builder is proud to be a RESNET Energy Smart Builder and is committed to increasing the energy performance of the custom homes we build..

Outside of a mortgage loan, the highest cost of homeownership is energy. That’s why smart homebuyers ask for a home’s HERS Index Score to determine its energy efficiency before buying. The HERS Index Score is like an MPG (miles-per-gallon) sticker for homes. After all, it makes sense to know the energy performance of a home before making the investment.

Visit Hersindex.com for more information.

Some answers that will help you in the process

With home energy costs skyrocketing, it only makes sense to find out how energy efficient a home really is. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates that a home built to the 2004 International Energy Conservation Code uses 30% less energy than older homes. Many builders today are building homes that use 70% less energy than existing ones.

A home built to the 2004 International Energy Conservation Code is awarded a rating of 100 on the HERS Index. This is taken as the RESNET Reference Home. The lower a home rates, the more energy efficient it is. Therefore, a home with a rating of 70 on the HERS Index is 30% more efficient than the RESNET Reference Home. A rating of 130, however, is 30% less efficient than the RESNET Reference Home.

The RESNET HERS Index is the industry standard by which a home’s energy efficiency is measured. The HERS or Home Energy Rating System was developed by RESNET and is the nationally recognized system for inspecting, testing and calculating a home’s energy performance. Certified RESNET Home Energy Raters conduct inspections to verify a home’s energy efficiency and recommend improvements that can be made to increase it.