I haven't had a conforming loan since purchasing my first primary residence. 

will this be a conforming conventional loan?...

The problem is landlords punt things in leases all the time that aren't legal or don't conform to the landlord tenant code.  

Called the city and they said it was "legal but non-conforming" and that permitting major renos could be a problem in the future and if one burned down we couldn't rebuild what would be a second living unit.  

@Dominic Tylor Laigo thanks for chiming in...that's great that it had an extra non conforming unit. 

Once you have a property profile, you can give it to any realtor, and they can find conforming properties.How to analyze a property is another topic that I can explain if anyone is interested.RecappingCity selection: Choosing an investment city based on analytics is not practical.

I am looking at purchasing my first rental property, however I was planning on using a conforming residential loan to get a fixed rate for 30 years to increase cash flow. 

Your deal may or may not be in an area where the city envisions multifamily in the future.You can always ask for a rezone but many cities will need a better reason than just to fix a non-conforming property.  

Normally, for a non-owner occupied property you need to do min 20% down on a conventional loan (which is really your only choice for a conforming loan).

If you don't conform to the reqs, you will have trouble getting a loan if you want to buy another property as your "primary residence" and may get looked into for mortgage fraud.