No, no IRA or similar. She had all her money in CD's at the bank I use myself, so it was a very easy, comfortable transaction to set up the estate account. OJ--no requirement to advertise for debts, I asked when I filed for Probate. And I've been pretty much handling her finances for the past couple of years, so I really have a good idea of who she might owe--have already checked with most of them. Think there's maybe one $7 newspaper bill outstanding, but other than that, I think we're good. Actually, I'm still tracking down money she's OWED--seems to be more of that than debts. She seems to have some unclaimed funds that I've sent to the state to investigate. And her auto insurance was paid for the year--she's due a rebate there, too. Phone company didn't ask for any documentation when I called to cancel her phone. Interestingly, neither did the AARP--I'd JUST mailed her entire year's premium for her supplemental health insurance within days of her death. I called, told them she'd died, asked that the refund be sent to MY address (not hers) and they said 'okay'. I asked--don't you need me to fill out a form, provide some sort of documentation? No. And the check arrived within about a week. Unbelievable. What if I hadn't been who I said I was? As to dispersing--I'm not rushing to settle the whole estate, but according to my accountant, I can make a partitial dispersement at any time. So I figure, in a couple of months, once the taxes are paid, I've gotten the auto insurance rebate, etc, I'll probably give the siblings most of their share, keeping back $10,000 or so just in case anything extra turns up. We seem to be working through this hassle-free. At some point, behind my back, the sibs apparently discussed and agreed that I should be given all the money that was left in my mom's checking account (it's not part of the estate, because she'd put my sister's name on the account, so it technically went to my sister, but she closed out the account with a check written to me). Their reasoning--because I've got all this wrap-up to handle and mainly because they aknowlege that it's been my help during the past few years that allowed mom to live independently in an apt as long as she did (rather than in a nursing home that she'd hate). I think I can count on everyone to 'behave', don't you? Guess the worst glitch we've had so far? When cleaning out mom's apt, I endeavered to make sure everyone got the pieces that meant the most to them. There was this 'lobster dish' that no one seemed to want (at least I hadn't heard anyone express interest). Talked my brother into taking it--one of those things that had been in the family for a couple of generations and I didn't want to see it given away, sold or disposed of. Turned out my sister wanted it--I didn't hear her say that, and she didn't take it the day she was up. My brother's happy to give it to her--delivering it today, as a matter of fact. Good point about hassling being the more expensive option--LOL--I agree totally!

UPDATE: Okay, we decided to go thru with the purchase. The more we thought about it, we realized that we had to take the emotion out of the deal and focus only on the house. Their agent is a real you-know-what (he actually put on the last counter inspection report "This is the sellers final offer. If the buyers want to break the contract the earnest money will be forfeited". Legally, I don't think he can do that. Nonetheless, we decided we really wanted the house because it met all of our requirements and wants in a house, so why dwell on something that can be fixed? And who knows? Maybe the guy who came out to inspect the furnace and a/c was just blowing smoke up my hiney (pun intended). So we took their final offer of $450 towards the furnace along with their $1500 toward closing costs. I've decided not to get a home warranty because, from what I've been reading, they're not worth the paper they're written on. Our local utility also has a rebate of $150 on a new furnace, so in the end, we'll come out okay on the furnace install. We're closing on May 16th, but not moving in until May 25th, so I'm going to have a couple more HVAC companies come out and give me an estimate on a new furnace and a/c and maybe one of them can do the install before we move in. I got an estimate from a Bryant dealer who said he could do the furnace only for $1600 - $1700. Seems reasonable. Thanks for all of your input! It's been very informative!

Well, thanks for the clarification of what I thought about the crediting thing. Sounds like it's a better deal for the buyer than it is for the seller, unless the seller's getting a big enough profit that the amount of the credit isn't going to hurt much, or there's room to raise the total price to balance out the amount of the credit. This is basically a semi-starter tract-type house (it may be 4br/2.5ba but it's small with small rooms, doesn't have a big yard or a family room, so it's pretty different from most of the other 4/2.5s around)... it's the kind of cookie-cutter generic vinyl siding, vinyl flooring, oak cabinets, Formica counters, fiberglass baths type house that was built in vast quantities in the 1980s and early 1990s (this one in 1994, but we joke that the builder was cheap and bought all the 1980s style stuff no one else wanted because it looked like it should have been built in 1986). It looks like it should be in a subdivision but it's not. Yeah, it's got a spiffy - if rather idiosyncratic - master bathroom we put in when we were expecting to stay here another 15+ years, but trying to bring the rest of the house up to par with that would run us easily $50k+. I had picked out a neutral speckly laminate (Wilsonart Milano Brown), not one of the expensive high-def laminates, but not something cheesy either. Because of the cabinet layout we wouldn't even be able to use the stock postform counters, which I know some people think of as being "cheap". Granite or solid surfacing would be inappropriate for the rest of the house - not to mention being yowza expensive, because there's a lot of counter for the kitchen size. , but it's handy; at this point there's a different stove and hood, different lighting and hardware, the floor's in boxes stacked in the laundry room... :-) Turnkey houses and "handyman specials" (the two ends of the spectrum) seem to be selling the fastest, but of course the serious fixer-uppers are selling for commensurately low prices. Our realtor did send us off to look at the competition/comparables, and we've gone to some OHs, few of which really seemed to be really close - similarly priced houses were either nice looking and smaller/fewer BR/BA, or comparable in BR/BA/SF and needing a lot of work. We had planned on asking a sensible price from the start, allowing for imperfections (we're not blind to the property's failings!), without completely screwing ourselves. But MY thought is that if people are thinking "gotta fix this, gotta fix that" every time they turn around instead of "hey, I can just move right in" when they're viewing the place, I expect they'd be likely to drop their offers even lower (which is exactly what I would do, and exactly what we did when we bought the house!). I'm trying to minimize the "worn" look particularly in the kitchen and baths, and get it closer to looking just move-in-ready rather than trying to make it look like new construction, which would be lame because it's not. For instance the once-shiny brass-plated plastic on the "OMG how 80s" contractor's-caselot lighting fixtures was peeling; I spent a few hundred dollars on new ceiling fans and light fixtures and the difference was overwhelming. As for hurryup-timing the listing, can anyone do something about the weather? :-) We've got at least two, probably three solid weekends' worth of outdoor work that can't even be tackled until the weather improves a good bit. We'd be lucky if DH can get that stuff even started next weekend - gotta love this spring weather, it's been snowing/sleeting/icing for the second dadratted weekend in a row! The property looks absolutely wretched outside - curb appeal? What's that? Don't make me laugh! Our deadline for listing is 5/25, being ready 2 weeks before that would be great but there is no way we can be ready much before that unless miracles happen right darn quick. And since Murphy's Law has gone into effect with an absolute vengeance in the last couple of months, I really cannot foresee any miracles. :-(

Just bought new glasses at Zenni. They're not bad, but not the quality I got at Sam's Club. Progressive lenses, anti-glare coating, clip-on sun glasses and new frames for $110 is a good deal for a backup pair. last pair at Sam's Club was $250, and the optometrist's office it was $400 + two years before. I call shenanigans on the story about the upside-down lenses. Even as a child getting glasses for the first time, I would have known if the glasses made things **worse.** As someone else pointed out, if one's eyes could adjust that much, we'd just exercise until we didn't need glasses, wouldn't we? In a former life, I had an optician that griped about me buying contact lenses *not through him* and told me it was illegal (sometime in the early 1980s). It would have been easier to purchase through him, but his office was so disorganized it always took multiple trips to get the right ones. Last time I went, I bought the one box for each eye, and went home to order them through the internet.