Wow…..that’s quite an estimate. The most labor intensive part is running the cables/wiring. Hell, I ran all that in my home for a whole home audio system in one day – by myself. And I have a 4700 sq ft log home. I ran a Cat 5 cable, two RG-6 cables, and speaker wires to four zones from a central location in my office that was going to serve as the ‘hub’ for all the gear. In that same day, I also ran two RG-6 cables and a twisted 8 pair phone cable to five bedrooms, the office, the living room, spa room, two loft dormers……..you get the point. It doesn’t take long at all.

When you throw in a couple HT set ups into the mix to integrate the whole home and HT’s, it definitely complicates things, but not THAT much. You’re in-laws will have to decide if they want to integrate the HT areas into the mix. I’d keep them separate from the whole home system with the exception of A bus connectivity and that will only be one more home run Cat 5 cable from each location to your ‘hub’.

After listening to several in-wall / in-ceiling speakers, I ditched the whole idea. They’re OK for background music, but just can’t compete with towers. But, the wiring is there if I change my mind some day.

There are several multi zone amps / processors on the market for these systems. I was going to go with Kustom brand six zone / four source unit. This one would play four different sources at six different locations simultaneously. At that time, it was going for $1500. Then you have the control pads for each zone, which run about $100 and fit in a single gang box. After that, you just run whatever source you want to the distribution unit. Nothing too complicated about it. Any idiot can terminate these devises too! They come with a punch down tool and all the terminals are color coded. Piece of cake.

Make sure you run the cables AFTER the electrical is ran. You need to keep your cabling about 24” away from electrical wiring on parallel runs. It’s OK to cross them as long as you keep them a few inches apart.

There’s plenty of info here for you to read through to give you some ideas. http://www.smarthome.com/prodindex.asp?catid=945