I've wondered these forums for a little bit over a year now, but I have just started the Great Property Experience Black Badge programme.

Unclogging a drain running auger for 3 ft -- $310; replacing thermostat in a water heater - $650.

Do you want it to manage door locks and thermostat kind of things or are you wanting to allow your guests tons of bandwidth and play xbox and stream movies?  

The maintenance person said only the thermostat needed to be fixed on the water heater.

Make your lease cap the thermostat temp at 72 or something similar - etc. 

Each of the 3 apartments have their own thermostats.

Nobody else can say what your mortgage is going to be, what cable package you're going to pay for, what extras (or not) you intend to provide, or if you go with the cheap thermostat so guests can abuse your HVAC or pay $200 for a smart one where you can set temperature limits.  

@Mark Fries is right, I got 1000 sq foot home AC for 3400 and the duct work for $3200 with new vents and 12 month supply of filters with digital thermostat.

@Ray B.Meanwhile.. do you have a lockbox on the thermostat?

Louis...it rarely gets cold enough to really need to go all the way, and there are additional, knock-on effects involved in turning off heat to a place for a long time that you can avoid if you just keep the thermostat at 55 degrees and, when the coldest weather is projected, you set up the lowest faucet in the place to the slowest steady run for the duration of the coldest temperatures.