Wired or wireless cameras for a house here?

Wired for anything you depend on. Power over Ethernet means one cable per camera, no batteries to change on a ladder, no dropouts when the router reboots and far better low light footage. Battery cameras make sense on a detached shed or a rental where drilling is out of the question. Carolina summer heat shortens battery life noticeably on sun facing walls.

Can cable be run in a finished house?

Usually yes. Most Wake County houses have an accessible attic or a crawl space, which gives us a route to every exterior wall without cutting drywall. Two story homes with a slab and no attic access over the garage are the awkward ones, and we find that out at the survey rather than on install day.

Will I pay a monthly fee?

Not to us and not to view your own cameras. Footage records to a recorder in your house and the phone app connects to it directly. Optional cloud backup for one or two critical cameras costs a few dollars a month from the manufacturer if you want it, and plenty of customers skip it.

Is it legal to point a camera at the street?

Recording video of public space and of your own property is generally allowed in North Carolina. Aiming a camera into a neighbor's window or fenced yard is where problems start, so we set fields of view to cover your boundary and use privacy masks on anything that overlooks a neighbor. Audio is a separate question and has stricter rules.

What about a new build in Apex or Wake Forest?

If the house is still framed, this is the cheapest it will ever be. We pull Cat6 to each camera position and back to the structured wiring panel before drywall goes up, then fit hardware at the end of construction. Builders will often coordinate the visit if you ask during the trim stage.

How long does footage last on a home system?

A four camera 4K system recording on motion to a 2TB drive typically holds 30 to 45 days, which covers a vacation and then some. If you want more, a larger drive is the cheapest upgrade in the whole system, and it can be fitted later without touching the cameras.

Home Security Camera Installation in Raleigh

A four camera home system in Raleigh costs $1,400 to $2,600 installed, with 4K cameras, a 2TB recorder and the app set up on your phones. Most houses need cover on the driveway, the front door, the back door and the side gate. We survey first, agree the angles with you, then give you a fixed written price.

Signs you need this

Packages going missing from the porch

Cars being tried overnight on your street

A wireless camera that misses the event and drains its battery

A new build where the builder left a structured wiring panel and nothing else

Detached garage, workshop or pool area with no coverage

You want to see the driveway from your phone while you are away

What the job looks like on a Wake County house

Most houses here are one or two stories with a vented attic, a crawl space or both, which makes cabling straightforward. We get into the attic, drop Cat6 down the wall cavity or out through the soffit, and land each camera under the eave where the housing stays out of direct rain. The recorder usually goes in a closet, a utility room or the structured wiring panel that builders fit as standard on newer homes.

Older Raleigh neighborhoods are different. Houses inside the Beltline built in the 1940s and 1950s often have plaster walls, blown-in insulation and no attic above an addition. There the route matters more than the camera, and we work out where cable can go before quoting rather than after.

What we check on the survey

We look at how someone would actually approach the house. That is usually the driveway, the front door and one side gate, so those get cameras first. We check outdoor lighting, because a camera that has to rely on its own infrared at 30 feet gives you a gray blur while a porch fixture on a dusk sensor gives you a face.

We also check the soffit depth, the mounting surface, whether there is a clean route back to the panel, and where the internet gear sits. Fiber and cable service across most of Raleigh has enough upload for four to six cameras to stream remotely without slowing the house down.

Hardware choices

Turret cameras outnumber domes on houses. They aim more precisely, they have no bubble to fog or scratch, and their infrared does not bounce back off the inside of a dome.

We use varifocal lenses where the distance matters, such as a long driveway off a wooded lot in Wake Forest. A fixed wide lens is fine at a front door where anyone ringing the bell is eight feet away.

The recorder is a proper NVR with a surveillance rated drive. Desktop drives are cheaper and they fail early under constant writing, which is a bad surprise the week you need footage.

Weather and upkeep

Summer thunderstorms bring lightning surges through cable as well as power, so we fit surge protection at the recorder. Every outdoor run gets a drip loop and a sealed connector, because water tracking down a cable into an RJ45 plug is the single most common cause of a camera that works all winter then drops out in July.

Pine pollen coats every west facing lens in April. A wipe with a microfiber cloth handles it, and we show you which cameras to check.

How the work runs

Free survey at the house

We walk the outside with you, look at approach routes, existing lighting and where cable can run without cutting up finished ceilings.

Agree the four or six angles

Coverage beats camera count. We aim for a face at every door and a vehicle on every approach rather than pretty wide shots of the yard.

Fixed written quote

Cameras, recorder, drive, cable, mounts and app setup in one number that does not move after you accept it.

Install in a day

Cable run through attic, crawl space or soffit, cameras aimed and focused after dark as well as in daylight, then the drive tested.

Set up your phones

Apps installed on everyone in the house who needs them, notifications tuned so you are not woken by a passing cat, and a quick lesson on exporting a clip.

What it typically costs

Job	Typical range
4-camera home system 4K cameras, 2TB recorder, typical single-story run	$1,400 to $2,600
6-camera home system Adds side gate, garage and a second approach	$2,200 to $3,900
Doorbell camera, fitted and wired Includes transformer check and chime wiring	$280 to $550
New build pre-wire during construction Cable pulled before drywall, cameras fitted later	$600 to $1,500
Detached garage or workshop link Buried conduit or point to point wireless bridge	$450 to $1,200

Typical ranges for Raleigh and the surrounding area , reviewed September 2026. Every quote is written and fixed before work starts.