by Michele Gillis, Staff Writer
The first Home and Garden Television Smart Home is move-in ready and is bringing national attention to Jacksonville Beach.
"We hope that with the notoriety that HGTV is giving the smart technology that we will be able to start reproducing it in some of our own homes," said Glenn Layton of Glenn Layton Homes, who built the home. "The learning curve for us was pretty strong is figuring out what technology we wanted to use.
"There are so many things on the market today. What we were able to come up with was a product called Savant. Savant has the ability to bring in all different technologies in one location. This Savant system allows you to pull everything into one mainframe and control everything."
Interested parties can visit hgtv/smarthome.com and video tour the home or if you are interested in an up close tour of the home, tickets are $20 and can be purchased at beachesmuseum.org.
Viewers were able to start entering for a chance to win the home on April 11 and can enter twice a day, once at hgtv.com and once at hgtvremodels.com.
The grand prize package is valued at more than $900,000 and includes the fully furnished home, a 2013 GMC Terrain Denali and $100,000, courtesy of Quicken Loans.
The home is in the Paradise Key development and was designed by architect Mike Stauffer and decorated by Linda Woodram, an HGTV interior designer.
"The cool thing for me is this was a collaboration from the architect, designer, house planner and my company to be able to build and design a house that meets today's buyer's lifestyle that we represent here in Paradise Key," said Layton. "So we built a 2,400 square foot house with two levels that lives like a 4,000 square foot house."
Layton and his team spent almost a year planning and construction the Smart Home, which offers technology that connects many of a home's appliances and devices, and allows occupants to monitor energy use and control home systems such as security, interior climate, lighting and other electronics.