Guest Post: Environmental Sensors: Home Safety in Philadelphia

Our guest post today from our sponsor gives a possible solution for monitoring your home, written by Ellen Dorris, a LifeShield Home Security security advisor. She has a passion for staying on top of trends and blogging in her free time. She writes about safety tips, news stories, and DIY tips.

The super early spring & temperature fluctuations in Philadelphia may be enjoyable. However, they cannot only wreak havoc on our lawns & gardens, but can also affect our homes in an adverse way. Extreme heat and cold can cause roofs, basements to leak, and cracks in walls and foundations. Intense rains and snow frequently lead to power outages. If you leave your home empty for a week or a weekend and extreme weather hits, you could come back to flooding, water damage, spoiled food, and overheated pets. Not only is this costly, but it can also waste energy (and grow your carbon footprint).

Environmental sensors can help you regulate the temperature and detect if water has leaked inside your home or basement. It can prevent you from incurring thousands of dollars of damage to your house. Renters should also be careful, because even those with renter’s insurance may not covered by flooding damage. Even when the weather is great, a burst hot water heater could really ruin your day.

Sensors can also detect extreme heat and cold. Without them, you might not know if your freezer stopped working or if your tropical fish were getting cooked. Temperature sensors can be simple or sophisticated, depending on your need and budget.

So how can you protect your home and the things inside it? Here are a few types of sensors you can buy and install yourself:

• Alarming sensors – These little sensors have one simple job – to set off an audible alarm if triggered. You can usually find these sensors for $20 or less, and are useful for alerting you to water in your basement, attic, closet, or other location that is close to the main living areas of your home. These won’t help if you’re too far away or while on vacation.
• Monitoring Environmental Sensors – These environmental sensors cost more, but they work with your home security system and are much more useful. For example, the LifeShield Philadelphia Home Security System environmental sensors work will alert you or a friend via text message or email when triggered. These sensors can detect water, heat and cold, and can be used in apartments or houses.
• One-Time-Use Sensors – Very inexpensive, these stickers or small gadgets expire after one use. These sensors are most frequently used for shipping packages and medicine that needs to remain at a specific temperature. The sticker will change color to notify if the shipment’s temperature was incorrect or inside a fridge, freezer, or other location to let homeowners know if the temperature has changed.

Picture by CBS Local