This 1989 video of ‘the home of the future’ is far more accurate than you may think

When we try to predict what the future might look like, it’s usually something like Back to the Future II, complete with the cool gadgets that will spice up everyday life like hoverboards, floating cars and self-tying shoes.

But one video from 1989 shows a forecast for the future that’s eerily accurate to today.

In a viral clip taken from an episode of This Old House, a man is shown around a concept “home of the future” in Pennsylvania. He marvels at the movable flat screen TV which, save for the giant attached speakers, doesn’t look too far off from the ones we have today.

"This combines two different technologies,” the host Steve Thomas says. “Flat screen technology, in terms of making the unit very compact in its size, and also high definition TV in the sense of getting well-defined pictures. The idea is that this would be a flush unit that would fit against the wall and is very manoeuvrable, but you can always position it away very discreetly when it's finished with.”

A “technical specialist” named Dennis Arseneau then demonstrates the house’s voice command system that can adjust the lighting by entering “evening party” mode. Plus, it can even call the police.

As viewers noted however, the program was perhaps a bit too generous in how good those devices are at understanding voices. Amazon Echo and Google Home could never.

“The part where he HAD to say the command twice, was dead on,” one commenter joked.

Still, it’s surprisingly impressive how a show from 30 years ago managed to predict smart homes today.