The detached single-family house, the great constant of American domestic life from 17th-century New England saltboxes to modern suburban mansions, is entering what architects and manufacturers describe as its most consequential technological phase yet. The rise of AI, they say, is on track to automate and integrate nearly every room by the 2040s.
The median sales price of a U.S. home was $403,200 in June, according to FRED data, and experts predict that many of the features discussed below will appear in homes at that price point within two decades.
Entry and security. Keys are expected to become obsolete. Keypads, sensors and AI-enabled cameras will open doors automatically. Michael Short, vice president of marketing operations and residential at Crestron Electronics, a Rockleigh, N.J., company that specializes in automation systems, said cameras will recognize residents before they reach the door. “Before you even get to the door,” Short said, “cameras will know it’s you.” Those AI-assisted cameras will distinguish between friends, family, deliveries and threats, he said.
Heating, cooling and lighting. Ali Malkawi, a professor of architectural technology at Harvard, said underfloor heating systems that use hot-water pipes will give way to walls that radiate heat using new thermally sensitive materials. Homeowners can expect AI that adjusts temperatures by anticipating occupants’ activities, Malkawi said, and heating and cooling systems may even coordinate with neighbors’ systems to improve communitywide energy efficiency. LED lighting systems that mimic natural light and adjust to circadian rhythms, now an expensive luxury, will become standard.
Kitchen. The kitchen may see the most dramatic change. Architect Sarah Broughton, an Aspen-based residential designer whose projects can have budgets upward of $50 million, said advances in technology and the current trend for disguising appliances mean “kitchens are going to visually disappear,” with appliances able to be “packed up and tucked away, so you’re not living in your kitchen.”
Janina Forberger, vice president of design at Miele, a German appliance maker, said traditional kitchen elements are largely vanishing or merging. For induction stoves, she said, it is increasingly possible for induction elements to be combined with other surfaces — so a countertop doubles as a stove. “You will put a pot on your work top,” Forberger said. “It will heat up, and afterward, you can remove it — and chop your onions on the same surface.”
Søren Rye, president and CEO of Miele USA, said AI-outfitted smart appliances will monitor food freshness. “Say you have some things in your refrigerator that are expiring in two days,” Rye said. The refrigerator will not only alert users but “come up with recipes that utilize them.”
Bill Darcy, global president and CEO of the National Kitchen & Bath Association, a trade group, said AI-assisted appliances will “make shopping obsolete,” with the kitchen figuring out what residents need and ordering and coordinating deliveries. Chad Jasinski, a Saddle River, N.J., automation consultant, said that robot-like assistance — filling refrigerators, emptying dishwashers and even preparing food — is “a totally doable reality” by 2050.
Entertainment. Jasinski said home cinemas will be remade by LED “video walls” spread around the house, and LEDs that can give a floor the temporary outline of a basketball court.
Bedroom. Tim Dilworth, president of 3Z Brands, a mattress manufacturer based in Glendale, Ariz., said the ordinary mattress will keep its familiar rectangular shape but evolve to monitor health with integrated sensors and adjust sleeping temperature by incorporating new materials.
Broughton, who designs homes that pump oxygen into high-altitude bedrooms, said that feature will become standard. Short of Crestron said heating, cooling and ventilation systems will go beyond temperature and humidity; after cleaning, a home may be full of chemicals, he said, but sensors will detect and remove them from the air.
Bathroom. Michael Seum, vice president of design at Kohler, said bathrooms will have “embedded levels of technology” and will become beauty and wellness consultants, advising on hydration and warning signs in stool. The American bathroom, Seum said, will become “a health coach.” He expects AI-assisted toilets to automatically lift the seat for a man — a possible leap in reducing marital strife, he said.
Jasinski said water itself will be upgraded at the house level: homeowners of the future will demineralize and remineralize tap water and then pump it full of oxygen.
A broader shift in housing. Glenn Adamson, author of “A Century of Tomorrows,” said the meaning of home could change radically. “We’re going to have a more fluid relationship to housing,” Adamson said, comparing it to the Zipcar and Airbnb models. “People will be much more migratory, and more interested in monetizing their real estate.” He predicted “many more people that live in different places and are flitting around, renting here and renting out there.”
That way of living, he said, recalls the country’s origins, when many private homes doubled as inns or boardinghouses. “Back in the 18th century,” Adamson said, “we were used to the idea of people just kind of coming down the road and staying over.”