Some advice needed in regard to alarm system for new home

Hi all

We are building our first home at the moment and was wondering if anyone could give us some advice please.

We previously rented a house that had reed switches on all the windows/doors and this is something that we have considered as my husband works away a lot and we have 3 young children. We thought this would be a good idea so we can arm it of a night time and as the kids are still up of a night time and sometimes do a bed swap it wouldn't set anything off.

Is this a good idea? Where do we start looking for something like this? We really don't know where to start and if this is overkill or not.

Thank you in advance.

Disclosure: I'm not a professional installer.

I didn't bother with reed switches on my house for security, as we have evap cooling and therefore need to leave windows open at night for cooling. All rooms with windows in my house (except for bathrooms) are covered by PIRs anyway so if someone breaks in while I am out the system will detect it.

My partner thought that the 'armed-stay' mode of the system would be great as they could have the alarm on but still be at home, but when I looked at it and the layout of the house (pretty open plan) about the only zone that could be 'armed' while people were at home would be the garage, and if I come home late and open the door then the system will trigger.

Consider instead a few glass-break sensors around the house. If someone smashes your window glass but leaves the frame intact, then the reed switch won't trigger anyway.

(I did add reed switches to my windows but for another reason. I have interfaced the alarm to the roller shutters so that the alarm panel can be used to open and close all the roller shutters. As I have awning windows, if a window is left open it will foul the closing of the roller shutters so the system first checks that all the windows are closed before allowing the closure of the roller shutters. If a window is left open, it tells you on the panel which one so you can go and close it).

I do have reed switches on all external doors, including the garage panel door.

I also firmly believe that people nowadays ignore external alarm sirens as they go off so much. I instead concentrated on making the prospective burglar not want to stay, by adding in piezo screamers in major rooms.

You can still have reed switches with windows partially opened for an evap air conditioner. You just need to:
1. Make sure windows are only partially opened say 100-150mm and can be locked in that position and
2. Have two magnets - one in the closed position and one for the open position

Well we won't be having evap cooling - we are in NSW and its not really the norm here.

About 50% of our windows are awning windows, so I don't even know if reed switches will be able to be used on them. I presume they will be harder to break into unless smashed so we may not need reed switches on those.

THank you both for taking the time to reply, it really helps when we really have no idea!