The $100 to $500 budget was just for IR extension task. 5 "Universal" URC-100s are already in house. This is the reason I am trying to find an IR system that will alow the use of the remotes. And yes, the URC-100 do have RF but so far I have not been able to get a responce from Universal technical support to see about the possibllity of assignable remote freqs or IDs.
It seems like this would be a fairly common situation when more than one person has a RF based remote system in a commercial or aprtment structure.