Replacing an Aux Switch with a Switch / Receptacle combo

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Kind of an odd situation I’m hoping to get everyone’s thoughts on. I have a 3-way situation with an Inovelli White dimmer and an Inovelli Aux switch controlling dimmable LED recessed lights. I need to add a receptacle to that circuit but I want it on the wall that has the Aux switch.

Obviously, in a normal non-smart situation, this wouldn’t really work because the receptacle wouldn’t have a constant hot. So, here’s my idea:

I’ve confirmed that when I dim all the way down, the lights appear to be off but the switch is obviously still on (the blue LED light is still visible).

I get one of these (a switch / receptacle combo) and replace my Inovelli Aux switch with it. Set the main dimmer up in Home Assistant to be Dimmer+Dumb, and then I change it so that a single press down on the main White dimmer switch just dims all the way to 0% instead of actually turning off the switch. This way, nobody can actually fully turn off the switch and the receptacle should (I think) remain powered.

Does anyone see any issues with this solution? I guess it’s kind of like Inovelli’s smart bulb mode but a little different.

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This is not allowed under US electrical codes and is very unsafe to do. You cannot power a receptacle with any sort of dimmer’s load connection).

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Perfect info, this is exactly what I was looking for. I’ll explore alternative options, thank you.

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What @rohan said, plus what I just responded to you on Reddit:

A receptacle requires a FULLY powered hot and neutral. The Aux location will only have one of those, either a hot or a neutral depending on if your Inovelli is wired as a neutral or non-neutral and you won’t have an extra conductor with a dumb switch.

Additionally, even though it won’t work because of the above, you can’t power an outlet from an Inovelli dimmer, as the switch isn’t rated to carry that type of load (which is why electrical codes prevent that).

Your best approach would be to cut the single-gang Aux box out and swap it for a 2-gang. Replace the Aux with another Inovelli dimmer. In the primary box, send a constant hot and neutral to the newly installed 2-gang box to power the Inovelli and the outlet.

Then bind the two Inovellis together.

EDIT: Thinking about it more, if you go with the 2-gang box, you can probably keep the Aux. You’ll have an extra unused conductor to send the hot or neutral, so you can use that.

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Great info. I’ll talk it over with an electrician.

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