If you have nay knowledge of networking (or want to learn), start setting up restricted VLANs to isolate your smart devices. Only allow them access to specific services/devices like your media server.

For dedicated hardware, there are plenarily of options. A Raspberry Pi will work to start with, there are Linux images with Kodi such as LibreELEC and osmc (I have used both in the past and they worked fine), and Android TV images also that can run apps. I suppose you could also set up a generic Linux install and run the Jellyfin client or similar - not sure if there any turnkey options for that.

We have a couple of Apple TV boxes and they perform well, the Jellyfin apps for them have really improved in the last year or so too.

I use Homarr and initially created a really complex dash, but I’ve since whittled it down to just the bare essentials as a homepage.

Links to my most used web pages and self hosted services, and a couple of vital metrics that I would need to act upon quickly.

For everything else I have Grafana dashboards I can dip into as I need to.

A few years ago the hose on our washing machine split and we didn’t realise until water started coming out from under the units. Thankfully damage was minimal but it was a big pain to dry out.

I’ve had some of those Aqara leak sensors in place since as a precaution.

Just remember to change the batteries regularly! Easy to forget them when they are out of sight.