The downside here is that this will require two loans, which will decrease my ability to purchase additional homes down the road with traditional financing.

And with a new roof and ac that decreases Capex for a while too!

These same thermostats also have an auto temperature decrease function which brings the heat down to 68 degrees if the thermostat is not touched for 3 hours.

Also, the re-sale price tends to contractually decrease for years after purchase, never going up.  

State the increase or decrease % and be done with it.  

Thanks for instructions for the alert feature, it's something I've been using since the beginning & I had to decrease the amount of places I was getting alerts from haha I was getting like 30 emails a day.

Are there ways to decrease the expenses and/or increase the income? 

Your suspended losses will decrease your gain when you sell the house.

He stated he would do work in exchange for a decrease in rent.

This would let you buy for 3-5% down and if done right, decrease your housing costs.