Even though the house is described as being empty it continues to recite its daily wake-up call.

In paragraph two, the house is efficient as it prepares the perfect number of eggs, toast, bacon, coffee and milk. Later we find out the house is also very clean and tidy as it washes away the uneaten food and totally scours the kitchen.

The house is also precise as it gives the exact date and location. It delivers a reminder about a friend's birthdate and the anniversary of either a friend or relative. Finally, the house is conscientious as it reminds the family about insurance and utility bills that are due and payable.

Of course, this persistence and efficiency are wasted as the reader soon learns the house is the only one left standing in a city destroyed by a nuclear blast and the family has been killed. Later in the story we also learn that the house is ironic when it recites the poem from which the story takes its name. The poem is about a world that goes on after a war and the annihilation of mankind.

In the end, the house could also be considered courageous as it does everything it can to fight the fire which breaks out when a tree limb crashes through a kitchen window. Unfortunately, all of the methods used by the house to save itself fail and it ultimately dies. 

The automated house in "There Will Come Soft Rains" has a personality all of its own. This is completely intentional on Bradbury's part, as he wants to show us how technology, if left to its own devices, can take on decidedly human characteristics. And the automated house has indeed been left to its own devices, since the family it used to serve was wiped out in a nuclear holocaust.

Unfortunately, the personality of the house is not a particularly attractive one. Having been programmed to protect the family who used to live in it from all external threats, the house is incredibly officious in carrying out its duties. Like a guard at an army base, it inquires "Who goes there?" and "What's the password?" whenever some creature approaches, be it a fox, cat, or humble sparrow.

As it never gets an answer to these questions, the house always responds in the same way, by shutting up its windows and drawing its shades in what Bradbury describes as "an old-maidenly preoccupation with self-protection which bordered on a mechanical paranoia."

What makes the whole situation absurd is that the house's officiousness is ultimately to no purpose. Since the family members that used to live in it are dead, there's no longer anyone to protect. As the above excerpt reminds us, the automated house is now in self-protection mode, which only serves to make its paranoia all the more acute.

That's an interesting question, because the story doesn't actually have any human characters in it. The reader gets to read about a house, which is something that isn't often compared to a personality. However, the story uses anthropomorphism to give the house a wide ranging personality.  

First and foremost, I have always gotten the feeling that the house is quite nurturing. The house takes care of the cleaning, it tries to wake the family up in the morning, it cooks them breakfast, and even clears the table without complaint (despite the fact that nobody ate the meal). The house sees to the needs of each individual person with equal amounts of detail.  Even the head of the household is not ignored in favor of the children, because his card table is automatically set up for the bridge game. 

I can't fully say that the house is full of soft, nurturing qualities though.  There is a moment when the house seems to get annoyed and angry.  This occurs when the dog tracks in mud.  

The dog, once huge and fleshy, but now gone to bone and covered with sores, moved in and through the house, tracking mud. Behind it whirred angry mice, angry at having to pick up mud, angry at inconvenience.

If the house were a person, there are a few other words that I would use to describe it and its personality.  Dependable and efficient are both words that I think aptly describe the house's personality.  There just isn't a moment that the home isn't taking care of something or anticipating a future need of the now dead owners.  For example, the house takes less than 15 minutes to collect the dead dog and have it incinerated.  That's dependable and efficient.

Two o'clock, sang a voice.

Delicately sensing decay at last, the regiments of mice hummed out as softly as blown gray leaves in an electrical wind.

Two-fifteen.

The dog was gone.

In the cellar, the incinerator glowed suddenly and a whirl of sparks leaped up the chimney.

In Ray Bradbury's short story "There Will Come Soft Rains," the completely automated smart home is the only house standing in the wake of a nuclear attack. The technologically advanced smart home is personified in the story and seamlessly performs daily tasks like cooking, cleaning, and issuing reminders. Although the inhabitants of the home are deceased, the automated smart home continues to perform its duties. In the morning, the programmed kitchen makes breakfast while the speakers announce,

"Today is August 4, 2026...in the city of Allendale, California...Today is Mr. Featherstone's birthday. Today is the anniversary of Tilita's marriage. Insurance is payable, as are the water, gas, and light bills" (Bradbury, 1).

The home is speaking to the members of the family, who have recently died in the nuclear blast. As time passes throughout the day, the home continues to autonomously perform its duties by reminding the family members to wear their raincoats. The readers learn that the last name of the family is McClellan, after the speaker inquires about what poem Mrs. McClellan would like to hear. Overall, the smart home is speaking to the members of the McClellan family.

In "There Will Come Soft Rains," the house asks Mrs McClellan what poem she would like to hear. As the family are not there, (they have been killed by a nuclear blast), the house recommends Mrs McClellan's favourite poem, "There Will Come Soft Rains," by Sara Teasdale. (It is also worth noting that the story is named after this poem which demonstrates its overall significance).

Teasdale wrote this poem in the aftermath of World War One and uses it to argue the futility of human conflict. For Teasdale, the world will continue even if humans wipe each other out:

Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree

If mankind perished utterly.

It is ironic that the house would recommend this poem to Mrs McClellan because in Bradbury's story,  humankind really has wiped itself out and the house, just like Teasdale's portrayal of nature, has no idea what has happened. In using Teasdale's poem, then, Bradbury argues that nuclear war has achieved nothing and that the world, depicted here as the house, will go on without humans in it.

Right before the fire, the house, hearing nothing from the deceased former inhabitants, randomly chooses and reads Sara Teasdale's poem, "There Will Come Soft Rains." The poem's theme—the indifference of nature to human existence—is identical to the story's theme and foreshadows the fire to come that will destroy the house.

The lines in the poem shown below state the story's theme or main idea:

Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly

As the fire starts, the house cries out "Fire!"

Before reading the poem, the house is in recorded "conversation" with the home's residents, prompting them about what they need to do. This is dramatic irony. Dramatic irony occurs when readers have information that a character or characters in a literary work do not. In this case, the house, which is the main "character" in the story, does not realize, as we do, that the home's residents are deceased, never to return.

The house's "conversation" has an eerie quality, as it highlights a normalcy that no longer exists. The house, for example, wakes the family up and relays messages that are now irrelevant, since the entire society has been destroyed in a nuclear holocaust: it states who is celebrating a birthday or an anniversary and tells the residents what bills are due. Similar utterances continue all day, spoken into a vacuum.