Smart Home Security Is a $10 Billion Scam — Here's What Actually Stops Burglars

The smart home security industry sells fear and subscriptions. After researching real burglary data, testing DIY systems, and talking to actual cops, here's what really protects your home — and what's just expensive theater. The Dirty Secret: Professional Monitoring Is Mostly Theater The average police response time to a residential burglar alarm is 7–15 minutes. In many cities, it's longer. The average residential burglary takes 8–12 minutes (FBI UCR data, Eurostat crime surveys). Most burglars are in and out in under 10. So what does professional monitoring buy you? A phone call. Someone at a call center sees an alert, tries calling you, waits for you to not answer, then calls the police. By the time a patrol car rolls up, the burglar is three neighborhoods away. It gets worse. False alarm rates for residential security systems run between 94% and 98% (International Association of Chiefs of Police). Police departments have learned to deprioritize alarm calls. Many US cities now fine