Home security system cost in Houston: what owners paid (2023 survey)
Houston owners paid a median $557 for a home security system: $128 above the U.S. median, the highest of 14 big metros (Census Bureau, 2023). When owners hired it out, the middle half paid $370 to $1,500.
What Houston owners paid
$557
This is historical spending: work done in about 2021 to 2023 on owner-occupied homes, reported in the 2023 survey.
Margin of error ±$141: at 90% confidence the Houston median lies between $416 and $698.
Hired out: $740 typical, from 61 hired-out jobs in the survey sample.
How Houston compares
- U.S. median, same work
- $429
- Rank, highest first
- 1 of 14
Houston: $557. The highest of the big metros.
1 of the 15 metros have no published figure for this work, so the rank counts the other 14.
- Houston$557
- Boston$500
- Dallas$500
- Los Angeles$500
- Miami$500
- San Francisco$500
- Seattle$500
- Philadelphia$464
- Riverside$464
- Atlanta$450
- Washington DC$429
- Detroit$400
- Phoenix$400
- Chicago$334
No published figure: New York City.
- Los Angeles$800$350–$1,200
- Seattle$800$400–$1,500
- Washington DC$800$300–$2,600
- Atlanta$740$500–$900
- Houston$740$370–$1,500
- San Francisco$700$300–$1,500
- Riverside$650$350–$1,200
- Dallas$560$300–$930
- Philadelphia$560$330–$840
- Chicago$400$250–$800
A metro is shown when at least 30 hired-out jobs in the survey sample stand behind it.
What it covers
Adding or replacing a home security system: the equipment and its installation.
The Census category is “Security system” within “Interior Additions and Replacements”: what Houston-area homeowners told the Census Bureau they paid, every size of job together.
Before you compare quotes
Ask every contractor to price the same scope, in writing. A quote outside the hired-out range above is a reason to ask what it covers, not proof that it is wrong. Are equipment, installation and any ongoing service separately identified?
Then put the quotes in your project budget worksheet to see each one's scope beside its price.