As technology continually improves the world we live in, its only natural that it can do the same for your business. While this is a relevant point for any company, its particularly applicable if you run a home inspection business.

In fact, advances in recent years have seriously changed the way home inspectors operate. From the way inspections are carried out to the way a home inspection report is shared with others, technology has changed the game.

In that regard, are you feeling left behind with your home inspection business? Dont worry. The following article will detail the technology you should be adopting for your company. Once the tech is in place, you will notice a significant increase in productivity alongside a reduction in long-term costs. Its a win-win.

If you have been running a home inspection business for some time, you will already possess a number of tools. After all, inspecting a home requires certain equipment that can detect issues the human eye cannot spot.

As for what this standard equipment package comprises, it features the following:

If, for whatever reason, you are missing one of these pieces of equipment from your arsenal, stop reading this, jump on eBay, and buy it right away.

Due to the price of standard thermal imaging equipment, this type of technology can usually be out of range for home inspectors. However, thermal experts FLIR has developed a cost-effective camera that attaches to smartphones. With this device, you can easily inspect a property for any problems that would otherwise be invisible.

What type of problems can it detect? Well thermography utilizes special color patterns that can identify cold, warm, and hot spots of a property. Due to this, it can indicate if a home is suffering from water damage in the basement, air leaks around doors and windows, and insufficient attic insulation. Thats just the start of why thermal imaging is an excellent tool for home inspectors.

Thats right: drones are more than just a fun toy to play with as a hobby. In the home inspection world, they provide efficiency and security.

Admittedly, they dont directly help in terms of security. However, a drone with an attached camera allows you to easily inspect a homes rooftop. No longer is it necessary to climb up a ladder and risk walking on a roof to check for any existing defects.

Remember the previous point about thermal imaging? Well if you mount a specialist thermal imaging camera to a drone, this will supply a clearer picture as to whether the roof is suffering from air leaks or insulation issues.

Technology doesnt just need to have a practical part to play during the home inspection. In fact, specialist home inspection software can greatly increase the overall quality of your business.

Due to the time-saving tools offered via this software, your business can instantly benefit from greater efficiency and reduced expenses. As well as automating certain tasks and streamlining others, the software also helps to reduce human error. This, again, helps to boost efficiency levels.

Of course, home inspection software has a lot more under the hood too much to list in this small section, in fact. It can assist with scheduling, management, communication, storing information, business reporting, and more.

In any business, you have to move with the times. If you sit around with what you have for too long, the competition will soon pass you by. This logic applies when it comes to the technology you utilize in your business.

However, its more than simply a case of implementing technology to stay ahead of the competition. This tech can also massively improve all aspects of your business.

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How Technology Can Improve Your Home Inspection Business - The Apopka Voice

Lisa Harrison Rivas, Staff writer

What to expect from a home inspection

For most of us, buying a house is the biggest investment well ever make. People often spend months searching for their dream home. But before the packing starts, its a good idea to call a home inspector.

Heres what you can expect from a home inspection.

An inspection is done after a house is under contract, meaning a signed offer has been accepted. If you are working with a real estate agent, he or she can provide a list of licensed inspectors. Lenders require houses be inspected for structural defects and pests, such as termites and carpenter ants. All lenders require a Wood Destroying Insect Report on pre-existing homes before funds will be advanced for the sale. The report will state if the house has an infestation or damage from a previous infestation and if the house has been previously treated for termites. Sheds can be a haven for termites, so they also should be inspected. Keep in mind, the Wood Destroying Insect Report must be done within 30 days of closing the sale on the house, so its a good idea to have this inspection done last in case the closing is delayed.

RELATED:Renovating your old farmhouse: a journey worth taking

After the structure of the house is examined, the inspector will issue a report on the roof, foundation, heating and cooling system, electrical system, plumbing and other visible defects. Common issues inspectors find include damage from moisture, aging roofs, heating/cooling problems and improperly installed insulation. Cracked or shifting foundations are common in South Texas. In older homes, especially in rural areas, the wiring can be a problem. Inspectors will check to see if the house has sufficient electrical capacity needed to power newer appliances safely.

Once the inspector finishes the report, decisions will be made about which items need to be addressed before moving forward with the sale of the house. The buyers agent will send repair requests to the sellers agent, and both parties will sign off on which items will be repaired. The long summers in South Texas mean air conditioning systems are running most of the year, so potential homebuyers generally want sellers to pay a licensed technician to do routine maintenance on the heating and cooling system before closing on the house. Inspectors say a lot of the problems they see are caused by unlicensed Mr. Fix-its.

If youre the seller, make sure to keep all receipts for completed repairs. And if youre the buyer, make sure you ask to see them during the final walk-through. The buyer, unless he or she is financing with a VA loan, usually pays for both the general structural inspection and theWood Destroying Insect Report, but like anything, this is negotiable. The cost varies depending on the size of the house, but expect to spend from $300 to $500 for the structural report. Again, depending on the square footage of the house and whether the foundation is a slab or pier and beam, a Wood Destroying Insect Report can cost between $75 and $200.

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What to expect from a home inspection - Shelton Herald

Age of AutomationThe design trend known broadly as home automation comes in many forms, from a command to Amazons Alexa to turn off the lights to a smartphone app that controls door locks and room temperature and a dozen other functions from across the country. This technology is attractive, says one local expert, because it solves problems in a very individualized way and people like technology that makes their lives easier.

When people think of home automation, what comes to mind? Heat controls and security cameras, for sure. Maybe the TV and music, or door locks, or window blinds.

Bill Laplante also thinks of his shower.

I have a digital control panel in my shower, said the president of Laplante Construction in East Longmeadow, noting that he inputs a user profile that gives him the exact temperature and flow he wants. My wife has a different profile, so hers is four or five degrees cooler, and a different shower head. A lot of this stuff is pretty cool.

Its stuff thats becoming more common in the modern home, as the rise of whats known as the Internet of things has people connecting any number of household functions to the Internet and controlling them from smartphone apps.

Take lighting systems. We changed our bulbs, and now the lights are controlled by cell phone, Laplante told BusinessWest. Ive gotten pretty lazy with the technology instead of getting up to turn on the lights, I just grab my phone.

But hes not just enjoying smart-home technology at his own house; hes building homes for customers who increasingly demand such features themselves. He works with EPOS Systems in West Springfield a company whose motto is Your future home. Today. on whole-home automation systems that run off one app, known as Control4. But people can take an a la carte approach as well.

Bill Laplante says homeowners have many options when it comes to automation, but many today are opting for full-home systems that run off a single app.

I see a combination of both. Some people, usually in the higher-end homes, will want a whole-house smarthome system thats controlled by one app and can do multiple things with lighting, television, heat, cameras, all of that stored on one app, he explained. And then there are other people who want less expensive options, who have multiple apps that do different things, but its not necessarily controlled by one central program.

The uses for such a system are myriad.

When youre away for vacation and you forgot to turn your heat down, you can do it remotely. Even the door locks you can send a code from your phone to unlock the door for someone cleaning the house or someone coming over to watch your kids, Laplante said. Control4 is really a home-management system, a technology-management system. You can create lighting scenes, you can control television, music, security, garage-door cameras virtually everything that could link together, you can link through this central system.

The popularity of so-called smart homes is only expected to increase as more people experience it and costs continue to drop. According to Forbes, the value of the smart-home device market will grow from $55 billion in 2016 to $174 billion by 2025.

Dan Crouss says home automation is about solving problems and quality of life.

Dan Crouss, owner of EPOS, said homeowners have many points of entry to choose from.

Sometimes you start out small, but then we tie in the music and the TVs and all that stuff into one app. You kind of piecemeal it as you go start small and work your way up over the years. Some people do it all at once when they build their house, but usually its small increments.

And its not as foreign a concept as some people may think, he added.

Everyones got some type of automation from their phone, even if its just Siri or Alexa controlling the lights. What we do is take it a step further, put it into one app instead of having 15 apps. Everybodys got a little bit, but were able to tie it all into one interface.

EPOS was launched in 2007, the merger between two companies, Perfect Sound and Olympic Electric. Its services have evolved considerably since then, both because technology is always advancing and because people are attracted to products that make their lives easier, Crouss said.

Home automation can start out as a simple Alexa that turns on lights. Then door locks and heat are two things people usually do. Being able to unlock your door for somebody when youre not home is a big deal. And with heat, I can save a lot of money. I get home at random times because of my job, so, if Im getting home at 5:30, I can log on at 4 and pump up the heat a little bit, so when I get home, its nice and warm, but I saved a lot of money during the day.

Then homeowners may add options from there, he added, from window shades which can be adjusted or programmed to bring some extra sunlight into the house during the winter or keep it darker and cooler in the summer to strategically placed cameras, both for outdoor security and to monitor the interior of a home when residents are away for the winter.

Sometimes you start out small, but then we tie in the music and the TVs and all that stuff into one app. You kind of piecemeal it as you go start small and work your way up over the years. Some people do it all at once when they build their house, but usually its small increments.

You can get a notification on your phone if you have movement at the front door, Laplante said. And you can pull up the camera view and pull up the audio and say, can I help you? and do it all remotely. You can be on vacation and youre answering your door, essentially. There are all types of things like that that are pretty cool, and most manufacturers now are incorporating things like this into their own apps and making everything as seamless as possible.

As he noted earlier, many people opt for buying individual devices, such as one that manages the garage door.

When your car pulls into the driveway, it will automatically open the garage door rather than actually pushing a button. You can also let somebody in your garage door remotely with your app. So you have individual products like this, with their own apps, which create the, quote-unquote, smart home, or you can have a central control system that controls all of the various components of the house.

The whole-house system can be preset for any number of situations, from delivering the exact heating and lighting arrangement upon waking up in the morning to creating a variety of lighting scenes in the kitchen, such as for cooking, dining, or hosting a party or telling the Christmas tree when to turn on and off every day.

Basically, what home automation does is solve peoples problems, and everybodys got different ones to solve, Crouss said. When my kids were growing up, theyd get off the bus and would put in their [front door] code, and I would get a text to let me know my daughter was off the bus. Or lets say cleaners come to your house, who bill by the hour. Theres a time stamp when they put in the code and a time stamp when they lock the door.

As another example, people with oil tanks have smart sensors that automatically e-mail you when the tank is getting low, or e-mail people who deliver the oil. A lot of people with vacation homes show up, and the oil is way down. This is a way to avoid that problem.

In Forbes, Bernard Marr, a futurist, author, and business and technology advisor, recently noted a few developments on the horizon when it comes to smart homes. One is increasing standardization, as manufacturers of smart-home devices are increasingly ensuring their products and services will work on platforms provided by Amazon, Google, Samsung, and Apple to capture the broadest customer base.

He also sees smart homes actually becoming smarter over time as they make use of machine learning, computer vision, natural language processing, and other technologies that are capable of making decisions and learning. Smart thermostat systems from Nest and Honeywell already use machine learning to adapt their behavior to the inhabitants of a house, based on observing and then replicating their habits, and that trend should accelerate to other devices as well.

Finally, the global rollout of 5G, as well as improved wi-fi technology, mean smart-home devices will be linked by faster, more powerful networks, meaning better access to data and processing resources in the cloud.

The smart-home technology has come way, way down in price, Laplante said, especially when it comes to buying multiple devices. The Control4 system is nice because everything runs through one app. But people have multiple apps on their phones for multiple things anyway.

There are many different components, he added. The cost depends on how much you bring into the system. The big advantage to having a one-hub system is that everything runs through that system, so youre going to one app.

EPOS continues to introduce new services, Crouss said, like smart outlets that can reboot cable or Internet if it goes down, rather than having to deal with physical plugs and wires. In fact, those devices can now send a signal on their own and be rebooted automatically when a problem is detected.

Most of my customers want this technology, want to be able to do those things, Laplante said. Especially when youre going away, you want to be able to control things, you want to keep an eye on the house. If you go away for the winter, you want to be in contact with your home, to monitor the temperature and see if there are any issues.

Not to mention that much of this technology whether its changing the music coming out of the ceiling speakers or stepping into a perfect shower is just, well, fun.

Its something the average person today is expecting especially the younger generations, he said. They grew up with technology, and they expect it. And it is kind of neat.

Joseph Bednar can be reached at [emailprotected]

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Smart-home Technology Puts Homeowners in Full Control Wherever They Are - Business West

BRYAN, Tex. (KBTX)- The driver of a pickup truck left behind a trail of damage early Saturday morning in a north Bryan neighborhood, according to police.

Officers arrested 25-year-old Adam Alvaro Garcia of Bryan.

Just after midnight police were notified that Garcia drove his pickup truck into a house in the 2300 block of N. Earl Rudder Freeway Frontage Road.

Investigators determined Garcia first jumped a curb on Timberline Court, went through the front yard of a home, struck a wooden fence, then struck a trampoline, and hit a second wooden fence.

He then drove into a chain-link backyard fence on a neighboring property on N. Earl Rudder Freeway and collided with the house.

The truck went into the home of a 72-year-old woman's bedroom. She told police she had just gotten up to go to the restroom when the collision occurred.

Police said the damage caused bricks, lumber, wires, cable, sheetrock, and furniture to fly into her home. Furniture and sheetrock landed on her bed where she had been laying just seconds prior to the crash.

The entire back wall of the home was destroyed. An electrical box and water line were also broken. Police said water was coming from the ground under the pickup truck and it began to flood the other side of the duplex next to where the pickup hit.

As police were investigating this, they received another call from a woman who said she saw Garcia strike her parked vehicle on Woodville Road.

One witness said he saw the pickup truck speeding before the crash into the house.

According to the arrest report, the witness and police both detected the odor of alcohol coming from Garcia's breath.

The Bryan Fire Department condemned the home that was hit due to structural damage caused by the pickup truck.

Garcia was taken first to a hospital to be checked out for his injuries. There at the hospital, he told police he consumed several beers before the crash. He also said his brakes on his truck may have malfunctioned.

The suspect was then booked into the Brazos County Detention Center on Saturday morning. His bonds are set at $6,000. He's charged with Deadly Conduct, Driving While Intoxicated, and Criminal Mischief.

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Man arrested after driving into home, parked car, fences, and trampoline in Bryan - KBTX

Issued on: 03/03/2020 - 08:19

San Francisco (AFP)

Twitter staff across the world were asked to work from home starting Monday in an effort to stop the spread of the deadly new coronavirus epidemic.

The outbreak has spread across the world since emerging in central China late last year, killing more than 3,100 people, infecting over 90,000, and prompting a wave of travel restrictions.

The social media platform's decision to ask its staff to avoid the office follows similar requests by governments in virus hotspots.

"We are strongly encouraging all employees globally to work from home if they're able," Twitter human resources chief Jennifer Christie said in a Monday blog post.

"Our goal is to lower the probability of the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus for us -- and the world around us."

Working from home will be mandatory for employees at the company's South Korea, Hong Kong and Japan offices, Christie said.

South Korea has recorded nearly 5,000 confirmed COVID-19 infections -- the largest number outside mainland China -- along with 28 deaths. More than half of the cases have been linked to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus, a secretive religious group often described as a cult.

Japan's government has urged the closure of schools nationwide and employers to give their staff permission to work remotely.

Most civil servants in Hong Kong returned to work on Monday after they were asked to work from home for a month. The financial hub has recorded 100 cases of the infection.

Twitter had already announced the suspension of "non-critical" business travel and events last week.

2020 AFP

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Twitter staff told to work from home over virus fears - RFI

Photo: Manuel Sulzer, Getty Images

Fire reported in Ansonia home where shooting took place

ANSONIA A Myrtle Avenue home where a fatal shooting occurred was the focus of police and fire presence Thursday after fire broke out in the basement.

Firefighters quickly extinguished a dryer vent blaze that had filled the lower level of 81 Myrtle Avenue with smoke.

The home was the same site where Michael Griffin was shot dead by police in early January. The State Police and Danbury States Attorney Stephen Sedensky are investigating that incident.

This time, nearly 25 firefighters and five pieces of equipment responded to the home shortly before 2 p.m. Thursday.

The maintenance man came running to one of our vehicles which was nearby dealing with electrical lines down, said Fire Chief Michael Eheman. He said he had emptied several fire extinguishers trying to put the fire out.

So a call for additional help was put out.

We got it out in 10 or 15 minutes, Eheman said. There was so much wind we didnt even need fans to clear the smoke from the basement.

The fire chief said the first floor clothes dryer vented into the basement. He called the damage very, very minimal.

Firefighters were nearby because a a tree limb had fallen and knocked down utility wires near the intersection of Orchard Street and Myrtle Avenue. United Illuminating crews were at that site restringing the wires.

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Fire reported in Ansonia home where shooting took place - CTPost

Q: I have a 2003 Chevrolet Silverado 2500 HD Diesel. My problem is that the heated seat on the drivers side comes on with no demand. I removed the door panel and disconnected the plug at the switches. The seat is eliminated from heating, but the rear back cushion heats up, sometimes intermittently. Which wire do I disconnect under the seat to eliminate this?

Ted

A: I dont get a chance very often to help someone try to make something stop working!

Your Silverado seat heaters are a fairly complicated system; seat cushion and/or back heat request switches tell the drivers door module to move on this. After communicating with the powertrain control module to be sure the engine is running, the door module sends a class 2 serial data message to the drivers seat module, which controls the heaters by supplying both power and ground. Thermistor sensors within the seat cushions provide feedback so the proper heating level can be maintained.

Without detailed testing, its difficult to imagine how the seats are mistakenly being heated. A pro grade scan tool can be used to observe inputs and outputs of both the door and seat modules, which would narrow the suspect list considerably.

A surefire way to cease operation of the drivers side heaters only is raise the seat fully for access and unplug connector #325, which is located roughly centered, two-thirds of the way back, beneath the seat cushion. This connector contains six wires; hopefully, the wire count will help differentiate it from the three other connectors somewhat nearby. The purple wire within this wire group provides ground for the seat back. Could it be chaffing on nearby metal?

Q: Your headlight lens article got me thinking. I have an older car with good quality halogen glass headlights and they could always be brighter too. What do you think of a relay kit? Do these really help with brightness?

Sid

A: Vehicles with the older/traditional sealed beam headlights can often suffer from voltage drop in the headlight circuit, due to skimpy wiring diameter, dirty contacts in the headlight and beam select switches, as well as in line connectors. Lets say your system voltage is 14.6 volts (engine running); you might find only 12.5-13 volts are actually making it to the headlights, resulting in slight to moderate dimming.

A relay kit, or a carefully home crafted equivalent, uses the original headlight circuits to energize a relay, which delivers a shorter/more robust circuit directly from the battery to power the lamps. Done right, fuse protected, wiring carefully routed and with good connections, this can reduce the voltage drop between the battery and headlights to perhaps 0.2 to 0.4 volts (14.2 now delivered). This can bring up brightness by perhaps 15% to 20%.

Is it worth the trouble and expense? Some think so, particularly if their original circuit is suffering worse than mentioned.

Im receiving some great feedback regarding home remedies for clouded headlight lenses. Ill follow up soon with these recommendations!

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Under the Hood: Truck's seat cushions heat up unbidden - Greater Milwaukee Today

Burlington Electric is partnering with a software company on a pilot program to spur charging at apartment buildings.

Electric vehicles have long been the domain of the single-car garage, but more and more, apartment renters are looking to plug in, too.

In Burlington, Vermont, renters will soon have access to more charging stations through a pilot program led by the citys electric utility.

The Burlington Electric Department is partnering with a California software developer called EVmatch, a sort of Airbnb for electric vehicle charging. Charging station owners can use the service to make their chargers available to the public, setting hours and prices within an app. Drivers can then use the app to reserve and pay for charging.

Burlington will be the first test of a new user group feature. Until now, building owners could only set one price rate for their chargers. The new software option allows them to set rates for different groups of people at different times of the day. For example, a property owner might choose to open their charger to the general public during the day but allow tenants to have 24-hour access at a discounted rate.

The new software feature was developed with apartment and condo dwellers in mind. I think the multifamily segment needs additional innovation, said EVmatch co-founder and CEO Heather Hochrein. Building owners have told her team theyre concerned about cost both the upfront cost of installing the charger, and recovering electricity costs from drivers. Leaders in Burlington hope the program addresses those concerns.

Building owners approved for the pilot in Burlington will get a free charger compatible with EVmatchs software. The electric department originally allocated 15 chargers, but because of high demand, that number was increased to 25. Owners will receive an additional $500 to help cover the installation of each charger they agree to make publicly available from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

As for recovering electricity costs, thats where EVmatch comes in. Owners can set prices either for time or amount of electricity used. The software automatically charges drivers, who pay through the softwares mobile app. This way, building owners can accurately charge drivers without having to install extra hardware, like a submeter, which can cost hundreds of dollars per meter versus $100 per year for the EVmatch software.

Property owners want something that can manage itself, Hochrein said, so once they set parameters for their different user groups, the software can run on its own. They can designate access codes for certain user groups. So if tenants get a discounted price, the owner gives them the access code so they get the discount.

The pilot is part of the 2019 funding round in the Accel-VT accelerator program (now called DeltaClimeVT). The program each year provides support to climate-focused startups so they can bring their technology to Vermont.

Through the program, Burlington Electric and Green Mountain Power officials chose the companies they want to collaborate with on pilots. Utility partnerships like this are especially important as Hochreins team looks for new cities to expand to, she said. The utilities provide the chargers and financial incentives, but Hochrein said the really valuable piece is their marketing channels and customer relationships, which are important for a small startup.

Green Mountain Power, an investor-owned utility that serves much of the state, also plans to roll out a pilot program using EVmatchs software.

For Burlington Electric, a partnership with EVmatch seemed ideal to help the citys apartment renters charge their electric vehicles. About 60% of the utilitys customers rent, said Darren Springer, Burlington Electrics general manager.

Vermont is beginning to see some strong public charging networks take shape, Springer said, but most charging still takes place at home. Drivers are usually encouraged to charge their vehicles overnight rather than during the day to minimize charging during peak hours. But since public chargers often arent available overnight, renters dont have much choice. This program should help level that playing field, Springer said.

The program could help the city meet its ambitious clean energy goals. Burlington aims to be a net-zero energy city by 2030. The citys electricity last year came from all renewable generation, according to the electric department. Now officials want the heating and transportation sectors to make their own gains. Plans include converting to an electric and hybrid vehicle fleet, so having more chargers can encourage that shift, Springer said.

He also pointed out the potential appeal for building owners to install chargers: On the one hand, they can avoid extra meter costs by using EVmatch. At the same time, in a city with a tight rental housing market, offering charging could be a key factor to draw tenants.

I think its great that they [Burlington] are taking these steps to try out what we hope is a reasonable solution at a lower cost, said Dave Roberts, the coordinator of Drive Electric Vermont, a group of state agencies, utilities and researchers that advocate for more electric vehicle adoption in the state. Pilots like this are a good start to test how they serve drivers, Roberts said.

The recently updated state residential building energy code requires owners of new multifamily buildings to be prepared to offer charging: As of September 2020, owners of new developments need to have a certain number of parking spaces ready for electric vehicle charger installation, ranging from availability for one charger if there are 10 parking spots, to charging availability for 4% of the spaces if there are more than 100 parking spots. (Like other places that have enacted similar policies, building owners dont actually need chargers yet; they just have to ensure they have appropriate wiring so their buildings wont require costly renovations if they offer charging later.)

You could make the observation that 4% of those parking spaces is a great step but longer term were going to have to figure out ways to get much higher, Roberts said. But for now, this should at least help increase charging availability, he said.

Drive Electric Vermont is preparing a survey for multifamily building owners to better understand the more common reservations about offering charging. It hopes to have feedback in late spring but Roberts said they expect cost will be a top concern.

Burlington Electric for now is evaluating applications from building owners. Springer said his team hopes to give chargers to anyone whos interested, which is why they expanded beyond the original 15 they had planned. He added that he was pleased to see applications from buildings in different areas of the city. Once they get the program up and running, he said, theyll evaluate its potential for expansion.

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Vermont city hopes 'Airbnb for EV charging' will give renters new options - Energy News Network

Issued on: 02/03/2020 - 18:09

Beirut (AFP)

Nissan's lawsuit in Lebanon against former CEO Carlos Ghosn over his use of a Beirut home will wrap up at the end of March, the carmaker's lawyer told AFP on Monday.

The Japanese auto giant filed a case 15 months ago against Ghosn on the grounds he was illegally using a large residence paid for by Nissan in central Beirut.

Nissan lawyer Sakher al-Hashem said the car manufacturer wants Ghosn, who has been living it since he jumped bail in Japan and took refuge in Lebanon, to vacate the house.

A hearing was held on Monday and the next, which Hashem said would the last before a ruling, was scheduled for March 30 by a Beirut court.

A judge last month rejected Ghosn's request to have security guards stationed outside his residence by Nissan removed.

Ghosn considers he is the rightful owner of the distinctive house with pink walls and pale blue shutters, located on an upmarket street of the capital.

The former head of the Nissan-Renault-Mitsubishi alliance fled Japan, where he faces several years in jail on charges of financial misconduct, late last year,

He reached Lebanon in mysterious circumstances and has rarely been seen in public since launching a spirited defence at a well-choreographed January 8 press conference.

2020 AFP

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Nissan case over Ghosn's Beirut home to end this month - RFI

One of the best moments of a long, hectic day often comes at the very end, when you fall into bed, pull up the covers and drop off to sleep.

Unless, of course, your bedroom is an uninviting mess.

A poorly chosen paint color you would rather forget, an uncomfortable rug underfoot and the glare of streetlights outside are just some of the problems that can conspire to create a room you would rather avoid the opposite of an ideal environment for deep sleep.

Our bedroom environment is probably the most modifiable factor that can influence our sleep health, said Natalie Dautovich, an assistant professor of psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University and the environmental fellow for the National Sleep Foundation, which has declared March 8 the beginning of Sleep Awareness Week. There are things we can do to improve the bedroom that will help us to fall asleep more easily, return to sleep when we wake up during the night and stay asleep until our desired wake time.

Specifically, the ideal bedroom environment is dark, quiet and cool very cavelike, in a sense, Dr. Dautovich said.

But by adding comfort and a feeling of security, we can do much better than a cave. For tips on how to design a restful bedroom, we consulted designers and scientists.

When your objective is to create a comforting environment, the bedroom is not the place to experiment with dazzling patterns or bold colors like lime green or fiery orange.

I like to make bedrooms super calm, said Timothy Godbold, an interior designer in Southampton, N.Y., who favors a crisp palette of whites and light grays with few, if any, pops of bright color. My clients tend to be super busy people who work a lot, so when they go to bed, they want to clear their minds.

Mark Cunningham, an interior designer in New York, also prefers a tightly controlled color palette. A lot of times theyre kind of monochromatic, he said of the bedrooms he designs. I think its a nice relief and retreat to go into a serene bedroom.

That doesnt mean light colors are the only option. Dark colors can be equally inviting, so long as you choose neutrals and stick with them. In one Manhattan apartment, for instance, Mr. Cunningham used a palette of dark grays, resulting in a deeply cozy, cocoon-like bedroom.

The easiest way to surround yourself in a calming color is with a fresh coat of paint. But in a bedroom, many designers instead opt for a soft wallcovering.

For one San Francisco home, Alison Pickart, a Bay Area designer, created a bedroom with walls upholstered in gray silk velvet. For me, bedrooms always need to feel super cozy, and I always love to layer textures, she said.

But the look and feeling of velvet isnt its only asset it also helps keep the room quiet. Its dead silent, she said, because of the acoustical quality of the velvet on top of the cotton batting.

An economical way of achieving a similar effect is to use wallpaper with the look of fabric. In some of her projects, Ms. Pickart has used Suede Lounge wallpaper from Phillip Jeffries, which looks and feels like natural suede once it has been installed.

Even patterned wallpaper can work well in a bedroom, as long as the colors arent too wild, said Ellie Cullman, a founder of the New York interior design firm Cullman & Kravis Associates. Sometimes it creates an element of restfulness, because its like being enveloped in the pattern, Ms. Cullman said. It can be very cozy.

An easy way to make a room with wood floors quieter and more inviting is to add carpet.

We always love a carpet in a bedroom, said Lee Cavanaugh, a design partner at Cullman & Kravis. Its nice to be able to step out of bed and not just feel a cold wood floor.

The softer the carpet the better, since its a place where youll often be barefoot. When the budget allows, we like to use a carpet with silk in it, because thats really soft, Ms. Cullman said. But there are a number of pleasing options that are less expensive, including rugs made from wool, cotton and other natural fibers.

Usually, designers install a wall-to-wall carpet or a large area rug that extends under the bed and other furniture, leaving a border of exposed wood around the edges of the room.

The choice comes down to the desired look, as well as the layout of the room, Mr. Cunningham said. Often, he said, if there is a walk-in closet or dressing room adjacent to the bedroom, well do wall-to-wall, just so it can run into the closet.

Light is the most dominant cue for our circadian sleep-wake system, Dr. Dautovich said, so controlling the illumination from windows is important.

The easiest way to reduce the light from outside whether its from the moon, an early sunrise, streetlights or the headlights of passing cars is with blackout shades or curtains that have a blackout lining.

The way the sun rises at dawn is particularly powerful. The gradual onset of light cues the body to suppress melatonin and start feeling alert, Dr. Dautovich said. If your desired wake time is after dawn, then blackout curtains can help with that.

Of course, bedrooms arent used solely at night. Most people also want privacy and some light control during the day, without having to make the room completely dark. Many designers use multiple layers of window coverings that might include blackout shades inside the window and sheer curtains over top.

Cullman & Kravis frequently goes one step further and installs blackout and solar shades inside the top of each window, and then a decorative treatment, like embroidered curtain panels, over the window casing, for a softer appearance.

In bedrooms with many windows, Mr. Godbold recommended installing motorized shades that can be raised and lowered with the push of a button (or smartphone tap), from a company like the Shade Store or Hunter Douglas.

You dont necessarily have to have electrical wires in your walls near the window casings, he said. There are a lot of battery-operated ones that are really good.

In the same way that layers of window coverings provide better control of natural light, layers of light fixtures can help create the right atmosphere at various times of day.

We are firm believers in lots of layers of light, said Ms. Cavanaugh, of Cullman & Kravis. We like an overhead light fixture, art lights, sconces and lamps.

Installing numerous fixtures and lamps may also make it easier to support the bodys natural circadian rhythms.

Dont try to get everything out of one fixture in the middle of the room, because youre probably not going to be able to do it, said Mariana G. Figueiro, the director of the Lighting Research Center at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. You really need bright light during the day and then dimmer, warmer colors in the evening, because thats what gives you that robust light-dark pattern that helps maintain entrainment for the circadian system.

Bedroom light fixtures and lamps should be on dimmers, she said, and bulbs should have a warm color temperature of about 2,700 kelvin. That way, all the fixtures can be switched on at full wattage to brightly illuminate the room in the morning, but then the ceiling fixture can be switched off and bedside lamps can be dimmed in the evening.

Also consider having a storage place for electronics like smartphones inside the drawer of a nightstand, for example where they wont disrupt sleep with late-night notifications.

A platform or a four-poster bed? A soft or firm mattress? Many pillows or just a few?

When designing the centerpiece of the bedroom, so much comes down to personal preference and sleep habits. But there are some rules of thumb.

In general, our mattress height is usually around 24 or 25 inches, Mr. Cunningham said, although some people may like it a few inches lower. To avoid ending up with a bed thats uncomfortably high, he said, consider how the height of the bed frame, box spring and mattress will add up when shopping for components.

For a reassuring sense of enclosure, Mr. Cunningham often uses four-poster beds in his projects. (He has also designed an upholstered model of his own, which he sells through his Manhattan showroom, Marked.)

Its also possible to create the illusion of a four-poster bed, if you dont want to splurge for one. In a house in Greenwich, Conn., Mr. Cunningham installed a ceiling-mounted drapery rail above the bed, with long, sheer curtains that can encircle it and park at the four corners when open.

As for choosing a mattress, Ms. Pickart stressed the importance of trying out several mattresses in person to find your preferred comfort level, rather than taking a chance with an online order. Its something that you return to every day to recover and prepare for the next day, she said. You really have to take your time and find the right thing.

To finish it off, Mr. Godbold usually keeps the bedding simple, topping mattresses with white sheets, a blanket or duvet and a minimum of pillows.

For me, its about having one or two pillows per person, and thats it, he said, noting the current trend away from the sumptuously overblown beds of decades past. Its not that grandma vibe of having way too many pillows on your bed.

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How to Get the Bedroom of Your Dreams - The New York Times