[dewilson58]

Originally Posted by Malsua

My wife and I are not snow birds, we come down all year to our home, but we primarily live up north because I cannot retire for another year or so. Last year we were down every couple weeks. This year we did a long one in the summer and one trip a few weeks back.

There are a couple things that I find invaluable.

-Wifi Irrigation controller. I bought the Hunter 6 zone. It is very easy to install and can be controlled from anywhere there is an internet connection.

-Flume Water monitor. This allows you to see how much water you are using. It will also alert you if it suspects there is a leak somewhere. Last year a contractor ran over one of our heads and we got socked for an extra 40,000 gallons of water because I was unaware of it. Next time I will know and can shut off the irrigation.

-Wifi thermostat. I have the Honeywell, but the Nest and Ecobee work as well. This will alert you if the temp in your house goes out of norm for a period of time, indicating a problem with the heat pump/AC.

-Wifi garage door opener. I let the cart people pick up my cart for maintenance. I do this from NJ.

-I have a Nest doorbell. I can talk to people who show up and keep an eye on the front door.

-I also have security cameras up giving me a pretty good look around the property and one we set up inside when we leave in case something blows in or whatever.

As for "cable" we stream everything using the Hulu package "HULU + Live TV". You can suspend service for 12 weeks at a time. The only real issue with that is sometimes our trips don't neatly fall on the billing dates so we bump into a new month. It's saved us a bunch though.