Lorawan for AirBnB/VRBO/Short Term Rental Management
The primary goal is to have a VIEWPORT (other terms might be dashboard) so that “at a glance” you can monitor and control your remote property for the benefit of your guests and the preservation of your property.
By focusing on the dual goals of 1) guest benefit and 2) property preservation you can, all other things considered, have the best possible chance of maximizing profit on the property.
Lorawan Advantages
Everything discussed inside this article is achievable using WiFi, Zigbee, or several other technologies. I’ve tried several, but Lorawan is very special.
Long Life Battery Operation is a game changer
Far and above, being able to install sensors without having to worry about getting power to the sensor *OR* changing batteries is a really big deal.
If you use WiFi, there is no using that device without getting power to it. Even on the low power WiFi, you must route power to the device. Even when “they” say it can operate on batteries, the batteries themselves are HUGE. We have a propane monitor on some remote short term rental cabins and those batteries are huge. I don’t worry about those devices since they are managed by our propane company. But the point is the same – you have to have power or a massive battery.
But a LORAWAN device has a reasonable sized battery and can operate as long as 10 years off of this battery. This is so incredible it is like saying – a battery for life. Even on the AA powered door sensors, which I don’t recommend, the battery life was exemplary.
Long Range Radios is a game changer
The LORAWAN radios can transmit several miles *OR* go through several walls *OR* some combination of reduced distance and wall, which is still amazing.
I won’t go into radio wave theory, but this allows me to have a single base station (called a gateway in Lorawan terminology) that can cover a 1-2 mile radius. This allows me to 1) have a managed basestation free from tampering by guests and 2) have a single base station instead of many basestations which all require management.
Where I live, I manage 4 short term rentals, a long term rental, a local commercial freezer, and our personal acreage with a single basestation.
Radio (not wires) is a game changer
For the same reasons WiFi is popular, Lorawan is popular too. You don’t need wires. This makes installation a breeze. Just power the device and install it.
Provisioning is a snap
Adding Lorawan devices to your network is very easy. You have your own credentials along with good defaults from manufacturers and you simply enter those credentials and the device is on your network.
For anyone who has tried to add a computer to a network via WiFi, Lorawan is way easier. Now just imagine adding 20 devices to a WiFi network. It would be awful. Cellular technology is worse! They have to have sim cards which are difficult and worse are a very bad ingress point for weather, water, and bugs.
Areas where Lorawan can Impact Short Term Rental Value Exchange
Safety / Arrival First Impressions
Value retention or anti-destruction monitoring
Guest honesty
Monitoring the Correct Data
The Most Useful Data
Door Open / Close
Thermostat Set Point
Crawl Space Temperature
Water Usage and Flow
Washing Machine in Use
Occupancy – Usually PIR (passive infrared)
Monitor and CONTROL of lighting
The Least Useful Data
CO2
Humidity
PPM
TVOC
Dishwasher Running
Noise Level
Light Level
Data (or controls) I would LOVE to have
- Smoking Alert
- I currently have tried the Milesight AM series but you cannot really get a decent alert if someone is smoking. I scan the market and even if you see a potential sensor, it gets tied into a monthly service fee.
- Vaping Alert
- Same comment as smoking alert.
- Party Alert
- I tried an ambient noise monitor and I just couldn’t see that it did anything. So my first foray into noise sensing was a big no-op.
- Dirty AC Filter Alert
- On a residential A/C this is way harder than it looks. I’ve tried monitoring the current on the air handling motor as well as monitoring differential air pressure before and after the filter on the A/C and I couldn’t get measurements that were conclusive. You would expect a trend line changing over the course of a month or two in a somewhat predictable fashion, but I never saw that at all.
- TRUE Occupancy
- The false-positives on the normal IR sensors, whether they are marked motion or occupancy are abysmal. I do think there are potentially active shutters possible on IR but I’ve not seen them. I have seen some radar/lidar based ones and certainly an AI camera is a possibility. Of course you cannot have a camera in the interior portions so you have to have a technology that gives you a signal without giving you a picture.
- Sour Food
- This happens all the time and stinks up the house – which is a detractor. Also if you could detect sewer gas would be useful. I guess these would be “stink sensors”. I haven’t seen anything that promising.
- Remote keypad programming
- Currently we do this with August, but that is a separate app from our LoRaWAN system.
- Remote Door Lock/Unlock
- Same comment as the remote keypad. Honestly though, if August had a better or more published API that would work too.
Surprising Findings
Most guests use the washing machine when they arrive
Monitoring water flow can detect air in the lines from city problems
Many guests simply leave the doors open for long periods of time
Guests have NO REGARD for energy costs
Lorawan Tech Stackup and Supply Chain
Sensors
Dragino Gateway
TTN Open Source LNS
Tago.io
Data Ingestion
Alerts
Dashboards
Remote App
My Favorite Lorawan Devices ( Sensor or Control )
- Dragino DLOS8N Outdoor Gateway – I’ve used these and they have survived multiple Texas summers. I’m very happy with them.
- Milesight Smart Thermostat – Massive over achiever. You can monitor and control your air conditioner via LoRaWAN… even when the internet isn’t working at the AirBnB. Set alerts if they turn the AC too cold and you can turn it higher. But even better is the fact that the data gives you can just about tell you what is wrong with your A/C or heat just by looking at the waveforms – if you know how to read it. My favorite device for sure.
- Dragino LT-22222 IO controller – If a LoRaWAN integrated sensor or controller doesn’t exist, this thing can do it. It does require local power rather than a built in battery, but that has not been a problem. I use them for 2 main roles 1) controlling the timing of my pumps for aquaponics and 2) monitoring the battery and solar panel for the Ridgebeamer.
- Milesight EM500-SWL – I use this for pasture tank monitoring in remote agricultural settings. It has a massive battery and it easy to make specialty mounting system that improve fast deployment. I also like the Milesight app.
- Milesight EM300-MCS – This is my go-to magnetic contact sensor. Good looking, rugged, long battery life, long cable and reports temperature and humidity too.
- Milesight EM300-DI – This is a digital counter. I use it in my rain gauge development project and I also use it in my submetering projects for trailer parks.
- RAK Wireless Button – I do use this to trigger local control for my aquaponics and greenhouse. It is pretty cool and a very simple device. The Milesight smart button is good too.
- Dragino soil moisture – Not a bad little sensor for simple soil moisture monitoring. I do believe that the ones you hammer in with a sledgehammer and can sense up to 3ft deep and at different levels are better for high dollar ag, but for simple home use or small orchards this has worked well for me.
- Seeed Cap pH sensor – I use in our aquaponics fish tank. Honestly if you are serious about aquaculture, you need to get dissolved oxygen and any other sensor you can get for water quality as that is a big deal. But this sensor is working well. The paper strips don’t work worth a darn, but the drops of liquid into water correlate well with the electronic pH sensor.
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