Washington DC

It's perfectly natural to experience fleeting paranoia that your apartment is being robbed -- and while you're lost in thought exploring those totally healthy and normal feelings, your apartment is being robbed. Turn paranoia into vigilance, with FrontPoint.

From two intrepid Georgetown grads, this Tysons-based company offers self-installable, fully customizable Wi-Fi security systems that can now be controlled and monitored from your BlackBerry or iPhone, enabling you to monitor all threats, investigate all suspicions, and confirm all your woman's intuitions. The relatively cheap systems can be set up in under 30 minutes, simply by placing various sensors in your pad's most vulnerable or valuable nooks, then setting each to the appropriate automated response -- from calling the police when a burglar trips the glass-break sensor on your porch, to texting you when a motion sensor indicates the liquor cabinet is opened (think your longtime girlfriend is sloppily cheating on you in your own bed? They've got an app for that too!). If you're more of a visual obsessive, Frontpoint offers small, wireless cameras that can similarly be viewed and panned through your smartphone; if no one bothers to steal your stuff, you can still aim one at the TV to watch Who's the Boss.

Since Frontpoint doesn't use an installed landline, you can easily take it with you if you switch apartments -- unlike your flatscreen, which is currently being lowered down your fire escape.