We used to live in Germany but we had the luxury of using the banks on a US Army base. However, I seem to recall that using a credit card usually gave a good rate of exchange (not that there are any very good rates these days since the $ is low against the euro). So it seems to me that you could open an account at any bank stateside and he could withdraw funds with a debit card from the numerous ATMs and get a pretty good exchange rate. You could set up a way to quickly deposit funds into his account without being on his account it seems to me. The only drawback I can see to this plan is that there are limits to how much can be withdrawn on a given day; to pay rent he might have to withdraw over the period of a couple of days. He might want to call a German bank and get some advice straight from them. Most people use their German bank account to pay all their bills. They set up automatic withdrawals for rent and utilities. If the American bank could transfer the funds monthly to a German bank that might work out even better. We kept a German bank account for our rent and utilities, but we had to make a manual deposit each month. They all speak English, or have a colleague who does.

If I wrote my selling story, it would sound almost identical to yours! Except for our issue (initially) was an underground oil tank, which we removed and spent thousands converting to gas and installing a brand new top of the line furnace. Our house is updated down to the studs except for the windows which were next on our list. New kitchen with granite etc. We are 6+ months on the market and about to expire with our 2nd realtor. Our list price is now down to what our comp houses actually sold for about 6 months ago and on top of that we are offering to pay closing costs. Two low ball offers (we, like you, moved and our house is vacant). Considering a third agent or FSBO. I feel your pain! Not sure what state you are in but in my state (nj) normally the listing expires and then if you relist on the MLS it goes back to 0 again. However, RE agents can always pull the MLS listing history, which will show the house going on and off the market over time. Buyers who might be considering the house will know, as will the local agents.

We offer first to family/friends. If nobody wants it, it goes to charity. My MIL was sure her house stuff was worth money. It wasn't. However, family members were happy to take the big furniture, so she didn't feel bad. Oddly, the various tschotskes DH and I couldn't stand, made her several hundred $$$ from an estate liquidator. Who knew, LOL? There is a wonderful charity here run by our city. They collect ONLY business clothes - cleaned, pressed, on hangers - suitable for job interviews. Low-income residents can go to their various training classes, which include what to do/not to do on job interviews and how to properly fill out job applications. For those attendees who don't have nice clothes for interviews, the charity allows them to pick two outfits for free. When my DH and I retired, we brought them enough to fill an 8' clothes rack. My MIL just passed away and I realized many of her clothes also qualified as "interview ready". DH and I cleaned out our closets again. His was clothes that had gotten too small or shrunk (he's fond of 100% cotton and some of that stuff shrinks more than others). I had hung on to some of my favorite work clothes, including some designer stuff, but finally decided after five years of retirement it was time to pass them along. So there went another 8' clothes rack out of the house last week! We also sorted through our books. We have around 2-4,000 books at any given time. Out went a load of those yesterday to the local library for their monthly sales. But the core of our collections remain: my art books, his hobby reference books, and the fiction novels we deem worth keeping and re-reading. Of these, only the art books are worth anything, and only to collectors. After I sorted through my art books we asked a couple of friends if they were interested in any that we planned to get rid of. They took two paper bags full. They were happy and so were we! Our collection is valuable only to us, especially since much of it is out of print. I used to give very elaborate dinner parties in the '70's. I had six different sets of interchangeable dinnerware and handmade bronze flatware, with lots of serving pieces collected from various places. Entertaining has changed and nobody does this stuff any longer. The main part of the dinnerware was a classic Mikasa bone china with an embossed gold rim, in a service for 12. None of my Millennial friends was interested in it, but fortunately one of our younger Boomer friends was complaining about her grandmother's soft-paste china. Such patterns can't go through the DW so she had to hand-wash it, so as a working mother (she was the breadwinner, in fact) it was too time-consuming to use often. She was familiar with our china and said she would be thrilled to have it. Made her ecstatic, and opened up space for new plain china for us. Yes, I still have the bronze flatware. Nobody else wants it, like silver it has to be kept polished or in bluecloth. Doesn't take up much room in a drawer. Oddly, one of the modestly valuable things I own might someday be thrown out by some relative who doesn't realize what they are. Back in the psychedelic '60's when impresario Bill Graham presented unknown local bands at the Winterland ballroom in San Francisco, for publicity they did not only posters, but fliers and postcards. I have half a dozen pristine, unused postcards of concerts listing Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, Cream, Moody Blues, Blue Oyster Cult, etc., stuffed in a box in the garage.

Thank you. We have been so pleased at the traffic and all the offers and the wonderful feedback on our farm, but it has not been a good experience with our agent. She has been dishonest and we don't feel she's been working on our behalf. On this deal, we sent a counter to buyer's agent, our agent called and said they want the contribution to as-built. I told her we will agree to pay half that, but do not want them coming back and picking our counter apart so please check with them to make sure that every thing else in our counter is acceptable if we agreed to half contribution. She called back and said yes they're fine with everything in your counter. Great! So I get their counter yesterday, expecting our last price, half contribution etc. and it came in with lower price. I asked for her advice because this was a lower price than they had agreed, and she told me that they never agreed to our counter, and we had discussed the lower price. Not! GRRR. So we signed at the lower price but needless to say are not happy with our agent. This is not the first time this has happened in our negotiations with three offers and it has made it so much more stressful. We just want to get through this one without giving up too much more, and if it doesn't close we'll be switching agents. I appreciate the opportunity to vent.