That day we were two hours away, but what if we were in Italy or New Zealand? Our house could flood while we were sleeping and we’d wake up to a notification of a leak. After our experience with the water leak, we were especially excited about having the ability to turn off our water automatically or remotely when something went wrong. We started seeing new solutions at CES and CEDIA, using more sophisticated technologies. If we hadn’t had that water leak sensor, we probably would never have noticed there was a problem, and it would have taken years for any visible water damage to appear under the sink.Īs the smart home market has continued to evolve, water leak detection systems have started to gain more traction. We fixed this with some caulking, but the whole event was annoying and stressful.

We guess that when they were cleaning around the sink, some water must have dripped down in between the edge and triggered the water leak monitor. Luckily we able to get a hold of our housekeepers, who had been over to the house earlier that day and came back to verify that there was no flood in our kitchen. Well, we thought it was great until it kept calling and calling, and we weren’t planning to be home for a while. The Iris had a great feature, it would call you in case of an emergency. We learned this the hard way when we were spending the night in San Francisco and our smart home hub, the Lowe’s Iris at the time, kept alerting us that there was a leak under our sink. Unfortunately, if we weren’t home, there wasn’t much we could do if there was a leak or a flood. We put one under the sink after we had a busted disposal, and we put one in the laundry room to would alert us if the washing machine flooded.

We later added a couple of water leak detectors to our house that connected to our smart home hub that would warn us if they sensed water. This is great if you have a vacation home that you don’t want to pay to heat when you’re not there but don’t want it to become flooded. In addition to keeping the house comfortable, you can set a low threshold on the thermostat, so your house never gets cold enough for your pipes to burst. One of our first smart home products was the Nest thermostat. We received the Flume 2 Smart Home Water Monitor as part of this review. Water damage is one of the top claims on homeowners insurance, and it’s usually not from natural disasters it’s from preventable things like the washing machine overflowing, a busted pipe in the wall, or a leaky valve in the garden.Īffiliate Disclosure: This page contains links that may earn us a commission from Amazon Services LLC Associates Program. Water leak detection is an industry with millions of dollars at stake.

Flume water meter