There is a LOT of disinformation on these forums about on-demand tankless units, ESPECIALLY the electric units. First, energy cost savings is NOT a reason in itself to make the switch. No reason alone is sufficient. It is the total package, in light of your particular lifestyle, that will dictate the pro-con outcome of the decision making process. First, tankless units save space -- a lot of it, especially electric units that do not need to be vented. In Texas we have no basements, so that can be an important issue. Second, an electric unit is unlikely to blow up, unlike anything using natural gas. Third, there is an endless supply of hot water, which in a successive-morning-shower household like mine, is a really important issue. And finally, yes there is some documented comp fuel savings (electric tankless over electric tanks, or gas over gas), that is really offset by the added initial cost of the unit plus upgraded electrical service or gas supply line sizing. Moreover, there ARE full-house electric units out there that provide plenty of water, unless you plan on taking two showers simultaneously while also doing your laundry and running the dishwasher! And if that's your bag, you can run 2 or more electicals together. Or get a really big gas unit. Bottom line, nearly every nay-sayer of tankless units ignore the pros and focus on a single con - cost, cost, cost. Well, we all don't drive a Ford Focus for a reason. Some of us enjoy our Buicks, Porsches or Camrys even though another car would get us from point A to point B cheaper while using less fuel etc etc etc. Full disclosure: I have a Steibel Eltron Tempra 36 whole-house electric unit. Love it. My electric bill went up nary at all.

Lol, kitty had just been shooed off the dr table. I brought home a sample of porcelain tile tonight. It's looks very nice and goes perfectly with the dark bath cabs & is ok looking with the counter. CordovaMom, this tile makes me dizzy too! I've always hated it, but dh wanted the floors to be the last thing we tackled, so here we sit. Tile in the LR is perfectly acceptable here (and common), but so is carpet. Wood floors and laminate wood really aren't very popular, except with people like me who prefer them when doing an update- and the rare custom builds have also used them, but for the most part it's tile. If the layout has the LR or a FR separated, then that's more likely to get a carpet. I'll see what the real estate agent thinks - he should know what people want or will think when they see our floors. I'll carpet if he thinks we should, but otherwise I think we'll leave it as is...if we had the time to install new flooring (even laminate wood) ourselves it might be worth our while cost wise, but since we'd have to high the labor I don't think it'd be worth it. I'd rather offer a flooring allowance if it comes down to that. After all, we still bought the home like this and it's a much stronger sellers market now than it was 4 years ago. It's rare that any of the older homes here have had any updating at all, so I think we'll be in the lead somewhat...if someone wants to look for themselves just shoot me an email and I'll send you the real estate link. I'll take a pic of the kitchen tomorrow after dh has cleaned up his mess from working on it today.

Yes, Try_Hard...there is more news & none of it good. It's gotten to be such a convoluted mess & taking so much time that we've engaged a REA to help play Sherlock Holmes. If we end up with a contract, we'll pay him 3%. Our counsel has told us on Monday that the builder filed a 'death bed' BK just before the foreclosure auction. I searched the online info & couldn't find it. I phoned the state's attorney at 4:30 p.m. on Friday before the auction to check for a BK filing & he told me nothing was filed. That's one of the things the REA will be doing...hunting down all of these docs & getting us hard copies. So, if the builder still owns the property adverse possession may not make any sense. We actually know where the builder is & how to contact him. We've not done it because we thought the property was foreclosed. There is a foreclosure deed at Town Hall. In the meantime, there's been some minor vandalism at the property. Somebody has shot what looks like a BB at the kitchen & broken a window. The glass isn't shattered but will need replacing. I go through periods where I'm excited & feel like we can make this happen & other days feel it's a lost cause. Hopefully, the REA can devote some time to sniffing out the trail. But, for now...the house is lost in a sea of AHM bankruptcy filings. I went to look another house yesterday. It's a colonial also. Built in 1799 & sitting on 6.5 beautiful acres. It does not have the view of Mystic Harbor but it's a lovely property. As nice as it is...I just didn't get that same feeling as when I first saw 'our' 1825 colonial. But, I'll drag DH over to look at this other one Sunday anyway. /tricia

We just finished doing this and encountered the same problem. In our case the bank (a small credit union) was willing to expand the area from which they drew the comps to pick up enough....but for us that meant that the house appraised well below even our worst case scenario since expanding that boundary picked up the edge of a neighborhood on the other side of the freeway that's been very badly hit by the downturn. (Of course when we asked the *county* to redo their appraisal in light of this, they rightly pointed out that the comps the bank used weren't actually in our neighborhood, and based on the one comp that was, the value of our house was substantially higher than its appraisal, and we would be taxed accordingly....figures! ;) We were fortunate to have enough equity in the house that we were able to move forward anyway by paying a small amount to keep the LTV at 80%, but it was definitely frustrating. Since we plan to stay in the house whatever happens to the value and we were bringing the interest rate down 1.25 percent which yielded pretty sizable savings in our monthly costs, it still seemed a worthwhile investment. (Also, there were a lot of sunk costs involved since we didn't get the appraisal figure till after we'd paid most of the fees....nonrefundable of course!) I don't think the bank would have accepted older comps, though, given the current trends.