Well, considering how high level the party is/wants to be, do we want to raise the ECL of everyone a little? I'm pretty much expecting this to go into Epic levels at any rate. And that would solve a lot of the problems we've been having we various templates and whatnot. Should we just make it 20 and call it square? That would give everyone a total amount of gear worth 760,000gp.
As for permanent spells... If we decide to go with the whole 20th level thing, let's say that everyone has 198,000 xp, and you can deduct the XP cost for permanent spells, magic items you create, and whatnot from that 8,000 "extra" xp.
How would that work for everyone?
As for the Sword of the Dales
+3 longsword, +18,315gp
water breathing 1/day, +16,000gp (taken from intelligent item greater power as 1/day 3rd level spell)
knock in 30 ft. radius, +60,000gp (2nd level spell applied to radius, taken from special purpose item dedicated powers table)
Lich's phylactery, 120,000gp and 4,800xp (taken from page 168 of 3.5 MM, lich entry)
Total cost of Sword of the Dales - 214,315gp.