No one has a crystal ball in regards to predicting the value of home prices in the future.Your next property can go up 20%, stay flat or even decrease in value.A lot of BP'ers are speculating we are at or near the top of the real estate market.

However - this decreases the total amount of conventional mortgages you can get if you did it separately.

You can see the rent has steadily decreased.

Residential taxes are a drain on local municipalities so they never decrease the assessment unless you contest the taxes, which is done often in Alabama.

However, if you consider the actual cash flow from a rental property, cash flow tends to decrease over time unless you are agressive about rent increases. 

You're net worth on paper may decrease but you're still making money... assuming rents don't sharply decline, which is unlikely.

You might make 900/month on those 3 Gastonia properties that are the same price as one Harrisburg property that only cash flows 200/300 per month On the other hand, the Gastonia properties will have high turnover and the occasional drama from vacancy and/or needed repairs, that will decrease their valueLots to consider:  nothing is ever easy :)I can't imagine managing properties from across the Country. 

I wouldn't advise someone in Real Estate to milk applications because even if the pulls combine, the underwriters will still see the number of new accounts, and the AAOA (average age of accounts) will decrease significantly with the number of new accounts being established.

But does such a conversion add or decrease value/appeal for later sale?  

Kerri - thanks for the  post ...consider  2 steps :1)  refinancing the  FHA loan to a conventional loan  to  eliminate the  FHA mortgage insurance  ..the  note rate might be  slightly higher than your present 3.875%  rate  but the  removal of the  FHA MIP  will likely leave you with a significantly lower  payment  that you have now  .2) use a  HELOC ( home equity line of  credit )  to  payoff  whatever  other  debts  need to be consolidated .....the  required payment on these  are  " interest only " payments so try to make a  larger than  required payment so the line balance can  decrease ......rates  are in the  5-7%  range ....interest paid  no longer can be written off  .......most lenders  will  go to a 90% cltv ( combined loan to value ) level on these  ( as long as you qualify)