Good questions, our house isn't huge (smaller than "normal" it according to that def) so light travels. We usually DO turn lights off before getting in bed but sometimes we are tired and forget, and it's not obvious until our eyes adjust. It's a little childish but it's like "ugh I don't want to get up"
We really only use lamps and sunlight aside from the kitchen so we're mostly using the plug-in switches, so it really is nice turning off lamps in 3 bedrooms + living + den in a few taps.
Might as well turn this comment into a little review of my Vivint setup. These are controlled via the console in the house, the web and the app:
- Alarm
This is nice because you can enable it after you leave the house, which is nice if you are in a hurry or just simply forget. Maybe not a killer feature.
- Front door lock
Same deal here, but it also lets me open the door for people remotely or grant them temporary access. It's a little janky, I imagine that the Lockitron is better. My main concern is battery life, which it alerts me about long before the batteries (4 AA) die. My second concern is that the gears inside will wear out, though it has lasted for ~3 years so far.
- Thermostat
Super convenient for Florida. We travel a lot so it's nice to kill the AC before we leave and still have a cool house half an hour before we get back home. There is an automated "Nest-like" web interface for this but I don't really trust it. Scheduling works great.
- Pan & tilt camera
This is more of a toy but it's cool, the other day we saw our dog tearing up the trash can in the living room so we ran home and stopped her (and put the can in the garage).
None of this stuff is perfect, and you are probably better off (quality and price wise) by going with Nest + Wemo + Lockitron + some alarm company, but we're still happy with it all.