Habitat is a startup that aims to provide a home automation platform that takes products you already own and connect them to the Internet and your mobile devices.

The Canadian company is currently looking to launch with four products that aim to make “home automation affordable, useful and enjoyable for everyone” that “don’t require an engineering degree to operate.”

The first product, Habitat Park, gives users the ability to automate a garage door, and have it connected to the internet.

It doesn’t sound awfully exciting upfront (how hard is it to push a button to open a garage after all) but their idea is actually rather clever; the Habitat Park is a dock where you place a compatible remote and it integrates into the Habitat home automation system.

The system then allows you to know when your garage door is open or closed, activate the door remotely and can be set to auto-close as you drive away. The use case argues that it gives you the ability to provide trusted family and friends easy access and the ability to program an auto-close time so you don’t forget the door open over night.

Habitat Protect integrates existing smoke and carbon monoxide detectors into the Habitat home automation system. It uses tone analysis to listen for alarm sounds and relays notices to your smartphone, and can even be set up to monitor for alerts such as low battery warnings. The small device is mounted on a wall, and in a two story house you’d require one per level.

The third device Habitat Learn takes the basics of the Habitat Protect and adds temperature, audio, movement and light sensors that can monitor and react to events in the home. The use case suggests that it is ideal for in home activities such as listening for a door bell, monitoring when laundry is done, and if a fridge is left open or a stove left on. Like the Habitat Protect it is a small wall mounted device.

Habitat Hub rounds out the offering, connecting all of the products to the Internet and to your mobile or other internet connected device. Habitat Hub also magnetically connects to the Habitat Park, reducing the space required for the devices.

The platform is said to be smart as it can learn your behaviours and device usage patterns over time to implement smart decisions for your home automation. It can also integrate with other home automation products, including Nest and Philips Hue.

Habitat aims ultimately to release new products that add Internet connectivity to more items in your home.

It’s an interesting take on the space. While internet enabled garage doors are not going to have a huge market any time in the next few years, the ideas behind it, and the other devices on offer do provide a glimpse into one aspect of home automation that isn’t really considered by the big players currently: affordable, simple to implement retrofitting.

At the time of writing Habitat has raised CAD$8,591 on Kickstarter with 41 days to go. The items have already been built in prototype, and delivery is expected in July 2015.