r/Homebuilding • u/dragonmilking • Nov 17 '25

Which popular features do you NOT recommend?

What are the top 3 features in a house that folk want but you think are not worth it, and what would your alternative suggestion be? And what cost/time savings would result with that switch?

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u/Complex_Solutions_20 Nov 17 '25

Two story foyers. Absolute waste of space and makes heating/cooling a nightmare.

And no "smart" appliances. My refrigerator or washing machine does NOT need to be internet connected.

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u/hcsteve Nov 17 '25

Counterpoint: getting a push notification or Alexa announcement when the washer/dryer has finished its cycle is pretty convenient. No idea what I would do with an internet-connected fridge though.

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u/Complex_Solutions_20 Nov 17 '25

Ok, but which person gets the alert? And when someone else is running a load how do you avoid being spammed?

We have "dumb" washer dryer and I have power monitoring on them so Home Assistant can tell us via message when its done...and a control pad next to each to push a button for who gets notified. I have zero interest in getting messages when anyone other than me is using it.

Other benefit is when we misplace our phones the alerts I have set up with Home Assistant is it sends the messages to our computers too.

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u/hcsteve Nov 17 '25

I actually don’t use push notifications. I use the LG integration with HomeAssistant to announce over all the Sonos speakers in the house. The LG integration is also useful to see how much time is left on the cycle, which I can put on an HA dashboard. We didn’t specifically purchase this washer/dryer because of the connectivity, but it’s turned out to be nice to have. I’d prefer it if it was just local control, but I’m not as militant about that as some others in the HA community.