Loren
Dragon Priestess
the containers don't respawn?! I'm never going to buy a house again!
The barrel upstairs respawns, but the dresser and cupboards don't. In the cellar, nothing respawns, and all the containers are safe for your personal storage.
As far as not buying another house. . .if you have Hearthfire, I HIGHLY recommend Winstad Manor. You can build a fish hatchery. As far as I know, it's the only house with this option. I used it to farm Cyrodillic Spadetail and Abecean Longfin for my restoration potions. The fish respawn after a couple of days. You can also have tame (non-hostile) slaughterfish.
Besides. . .you can always buy a house, back out of the dialogue, and stash all your money into a nearby container, and get the key without actually paying for the house.
Back on topic. . .yes, poor Narfi. That was one of two Dark Brotherhood contracts I actually felt bad about. The other was the optional contract on Nilsine. Not because I felt bad about her, but because it apparently triggers Tova Shattershield's suicide.