It's common for traveling medical professionals to extend their contracts.

Verifying last 2 years of rental history and income extremely important to find the “best of the worst”.Make sure you understand the Class of properties you are looking at and the corresponding results to expect.The City of Detroit has 183 Neighborhoods we’ve analyzed.PM us if you’d like to discuss this logical approach in greater detail!

In that area you're looking at average rents in the $1,200 - $1,300/mo range unless this house is extremely nice.

Eviction and foreclosure are two common real estate processes where you always want to use a lawyer from beginning to end.

In your experience do you see people commonly attempting to offset ordinary income / W2 with syndicated losses, despite the above?

There is very little technical knowledge needed, but there is a lot of common sense needed.I would google "rental property investing for beginners" and see what you uncover.  

Extremely solid advice.

"Is it a common practice to report it as a loss even though I fixed it out of my own pocket?" 

I don't know your market at all, but it's common for neighborhoods next to the hospital to not always feel safe to out of town nurses--- so just know proximity isn't always the main point.

You think through the major systems in the house (roof, exterior or tuck pointing, hvac, plumbing, electrical, unit turns, common areas) and if they are all new you should be good for a few years (5-10).