@butterfish55 installed a transfer switch for me, and I honestly thing it had been great. It pretty much powers the whole house to a certain degree, minus a few things.
Obviously the drawback is I had to buy a big generator and lugging that up to the driveway if I didn’t prepare beforehand can be annoying.
The price of that obviously dwarfs a whole house though. 3 of my neighbors have generacs and I don’t think they’ll ever reasonably get the cost back on that, we just don’t lose power enough. If money is no object, it’s probably the way to go though.
I know one of the neighbors regrets putting it in because the longest we’ve lost power in the 3-4 years he’s had it is like 3-4 hours.