Salesman came by yesterday. Wondering if you fine people have any input on them. TIA

I just looked at their website they seem pretty pricey if you are just looking for home security. We use Smith Thompson. They are good and very affordable. $55 for 3 months.

We use vivint and I don't really have any complaints. The wife wanted it since I was traveling quite a bit, so I guess it's worth the money for the piece of mind it give her.

We don't have a land line, so they're able to remotely monitor via cellular or something like that. Works well for us since I have no plans on getting a land line. I think we pay about $40 a month. The previous homeowners had the house wired but not hooked up for security, so I don't think installation cost us anything.

One thing that I actually like is there is an app you can download that will effectively let you control the system from your phone. It also gives you alerts if there's been a disturbance.

They came by my house yesterday and the salesman seemed like used car salespeople, did not have a good feeling about them.

Looked them up and seems they have lots of people complaining about the contract and how it is very difficult to get out of it in the future. Made it seem like it was a 4 or 5 year deal that was difficult to break

So, besides the contract thing, anyone have any personal experience with this company?

Had a guy come to my house yesterday basically saying they were trying to penetrate our neighborhood and were going to give us all of the equipment for free with no cost install. The only thing they want is for us to put a little sign in the yard (just like our current ADT sign) and be a reference so that they can sell to the rest of my neighborhood "Look, SuperAg's got our system and loves it!".

I figure with the touch screen keypads and thermostat and the added sensors and things, that's probably a pretty decent cost savings. The monthly fee might be slightly higher than ADT ($50 vs $35), but it seems like it has a lot more features than my basic ADT set-up now.

SuperAg,

I had the same thing about 3 weeks ago. Fairly young salesman saying they are trying to get into our neighborhood and offered me a $3,000 video monitoring system. I had not ever heard of them and got pretty leery when he said he needed to come in and have me show him how our alarm works. He was a bit of a seedy looking character and I had never heard of the company before, so I told him we were not interested.

It would be cool to have all the video monitoring, but we use smith thompson so it would be hard to justify going to $50 a month from $17.

Had a young salesman come by and my wife answered, thought it was my sons friend. His first (and almost last) action was to place his hand on my door and say..."ok I just need to make sure your current system is compatible with ours, then I can explain all the wonderful discounts available to you." I walked up as my wife pushed the door and said wait a minute. Nearly punched the young lad in his throat. Used car salesman hits it on the nose.

Smith-Thompson FTW.

No contract, can use the existing equipment in your house about 97% of the time, and if you pay a year at a time you get a month free.

I'll happily be the reference for any of you, since every reference also gets you a free month.

I was visited by them a few weeks ago, said if you can pay off my ADT contract you've got my business if not get off my property.

He said thank you for your time and left.

Seemed easy enough to get rid of him.

Run away. Stereotypical used car salesman ftw. Gave me $100 cash out of his pocket to seal the deal. The contract is bulletproof and their van is a block away. They install within ten minutes of him leaving your door. Cannot reschedule, etc, then you would have time to google them and find out the truth.

the equipment is good. But I hate the sales model and you are stuck in contract for full length. Period.

The contract is what worries me a bit. I've been with ADT for 5 years, but my system is just the basic one (couple of keypads, sensors, fire alarm sensor, etc). I really don't use the alarm at all because it's a pain to remember to punch in the code when I come and go.

I would really like the ability to control it from my phone, have video monitoring while I am away, connected to thermostat, etc. If ADT would match, I would prefer to stay with them. Unfortunately, it's not their business model to try to match competition. It is what it is.

SO I can stay paying $35/mo for my current basic service, or I can pay an extra $15/mo over a 4/5 yr contract ($900 over 5 years) to have the newer features that this company provides...

The idea of video monitoring in my own home scares the bejeezus out of me. But that's just me.

The more bells and whistles, the more opportunity for the NSA, FBI, CIA or some other government alphabet agency to make up an excuse to either forcibly demand rights and access to the system, or to hack into it to watch me and my family without my consent, or to decide that my thermostat needs to be at a certain temp despite what I personally decide. There is enough big brother out there.

I'll take my $18 per month monitoring fee and be happy with it.

Oh, and in a completely unrelated note, there was a break in a few blocks away in my neighborhood last night and the intruder was shot by the homeowner.

I have read some rumors than some Vivint salespeople will go do a quick B&E to scare a homeowner and then show up the next day to conveniently offer them a home security system. Not saying that is what happened here, but the timing is certainly interesting. And if it happened, that guy picked the wrong house to try to scare.

I guess we'll see if the salesperson shows up at his appointment with my neighbor today. If not, this story might have an interesting twist.

Installed them this spring, technology is way cool(droid and apple apps). Contract is pretty strong but not scary. I called them so there was no hard sell. We got over promised on the sales call and upon installation we needed more equipment at additional cost. *****ed a little and a call was made and it was taken care of. The 2 way monitoring is cool, think On-Star.
alarm...loud tone...Mr. Deats99 this is Vivint we detected a glass break in your living room..are you alright?
If you use them feel free to say I referred you
Jeff Deats ph# 214-six 0 one-8181

"When the government fears the people, you have liberty; when the people fear the government, you have tyranny." Thomas Jefferson
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
Edmund Burke

Super. That'd be a really stupid way to "drum up" business in Texas.

In that incident you mentioned, the home owner also apparently shot through/into a neighbor's house potentially causing a 14-year old girl to have a seizure.

If anyone wants I have a vivnt panel and motion dectector I pulled out of my new house. I will sell it to you for $50. Email in profile

We have them and the actual security service is fine but their customer service is very shady. On 4 different occasions we have had them tell us something regarding our contract/billing and then back track on it. When this contract expires I will not be using them again.

We had a vivint salesman come by. Super pushy and annoying.

We ended up going with Simplisafe. $15-$25 per month for monitoring ($25 lets you control/interface with the system from phone app), $200-$400 hardware purchase. All wireless, installs in about 15 minutes. No contracts. Love it.

They offer smoke detectors, entry sensors, motion sensors, CO sensors, glass break sensors, and flood sensors. After purchasing a basic package (base, keypad, a few entry sensors), all additional pieces are modular: add what you need.

http://simplisafe.com/

[This message has been edited by MEAg09 (edited 6/20/2013 2:43p).]

I'll also say that their equipment is pretty cool, but their tactics are borderline criminal. One of their sales guys knocked on the door and told me he was from my alarm company, and was there to upgrade my equipment at no cost ... When I said I didn't use Vivint, he said, "Oh, well, we bought your old company, XYZ, and your equipment is now obsolete. I need to upgrade it or it soon won't function properly."

He then pulled out photos of my exact equipment, and showed me the new stuff ... I knew he was full of it, but our neighborhood had experienced several break-ins and I wanted something a bit more.

As I said, the equipment was really nice and seemed to do everything they said it would. But the ironclad contract (four years, I believe, at $40-50 per month) made me pause. Fortunately, we ended up selling the house later that year and the new owners agreed to take over the contract. Otherwise, I doubt they would have let us out without paying them the balance owed.

In short, VERY sketchy sales tactics (to include outright lying to your face), but nice, state-of-the-art equipment with LONG contracts ... YMMV.