Alarm Monitoring Prices
How much is a home security system?
Like most purchases the answer is “it depends”? The prices and methods of purchasing a home alarm system vary greatly. Some systems require large up front installation costs upwards of $1000. Other systems are very low up front, but have a multi-year contract.
Buying Versus Leasing
Let’s look at buying the security system equipment outright:
- $700 installation, and all equipment
- $15 per month for monitoring (single monitoring station)
In this case your month alarm system costs break down as:
- Total cost after year 1: $880 (average of approximately $73.33 per month)
- Total cost after year 2: $1060 (average of approximately $44.16 per month)
- Total cost after year 3: $1240 (average of approximately $34.44 per month)
- Total cost after year 4: $1420 (average of approximately $29.58 per month)
As you can see the costs descends as you own the system, this is presuming your monitoring costs do not increases, and you do not need any service, or replacement of security devices.
Now compare this to ADT:
- Installation cost of $99
- Monthly monitoring cost of $33.95, locked into a 3 year contract (7 interconnected monitoring stations)
In this case using ADT as your security company gives you the following monthly costs:
- Total cost after year 1: $519 (average of approximately $42.20 per month)
- Total cost after year 2: $923.80 (average of approximately $38.07 per month)
- Total cost after year 3: $1321.20 (average of approximately $36.70 per month)
The advantage to the leased system is the low up front costs. lifetime warranty and servicing. Costs are lower up front, but guaranteed long term due to warranty and servicing included.
