My choice with their new house was pretty simple. They wanted a smart home, and being the tech son I would inevitably have to help them at some point. So either I debug a system that is open and familiar, with remote access and reliable software/hardware. Or I deal with some closed proprietary trash which will end-up with me on the phone with some incompetent cash grab company. As mentioned in my post, the latter would have cost 3 to 4 times the price of all the hardware we bought (see the link) and we would just get some SBC or cheap tower instead.

With the current setup, I can easily connect via VPN to configure network devices. Ubiquiti also makes it very simple to apply network changes or upgrade it remotely (as long as it's from the same brand). I set up extensive monitoring and alerting to proactively resolve issues. I also gave my parents some training and docs on how to plug things to the Ethernet sockets (if they want to setup a new printer for example) or what to do to bypass the router (rewiring) in case the main router fails.

As a side note to helping my parents. They are both 70, not the most tech literate people but they manage to do all basic things without much trouble. I put them both on Ubuntu 8 years ago, never had any issues whatsoever. I get maybe one message or call in 6 months for a question, but it's usually web related. Once in a while when I get home I update the distro, but that's pretty much all the maintenance I do. I have Teamviewer on all their devices, just in case but never really had to use it so far.