I am purchasing my first rental property (multi-family) unit in Salisbury North Carolina. 

My plan is to sell my primary home in New York and purchase a house to live in South Carolina.

Should I be looking for selling all or a portion of the note? 

The replacement property must be similar in that it is another rental property. 

Does anyone have experience rehabbing fire-damaged properties?

Thus paying less total interest on both properties.

Local PM here - we have multiple development projects we are gearing up to sell, both small multifamily and townhouses should you want to take a peak at them.

Simply gifting him half the property now wouldn’t immediately allow him to claim the exclusion without fulfilling this residency requirement, I don't believe.One thought would be to use a HELOC to pull just enough equity out of the current home and use it to buy a smaller home, or at least the down payment.

Be mindful of a gift tax implications if you sell a house for less than FMV.Also be mindful of transactions between related parties when selling at a loss.

It's a place to legally go and sell stock/business without capital gains.