He was telling me about one of the new laws that was enacted this year that in order to avoid capital gains tax when selling a “personal residence” you NOW have to have lived in the property for 8 years.

The intent here is to purchase a new primary residence.  

By deferring maintenance, an investor gets a property that has not been maintained and therefore residents leave quickly.  

The network and broker you are with can certainly help boost your success, but in my opinion nothing replaces putting in the time and being creative with how you operate your business to show how you, as an agent, are unique to your clients (Investors, people planning to buy for their primary residence, etc.)I also have an REI mentor who has helped with my process a lot if you would like a recommendation.

It seems that you are trying to adapt this to your primary residence. 

I'm thinking about putting my rental property with the same insurance company that I use for my primary residence so I can get an umbrella policy from them.

Here is my current financial situation: My primary residence is paid off and my current equity is worth about 200k.

We were brainstorming some strategies to purchase our first property, we have an idea to purchase one home with conventional lending and the mortgage in my name (I have an FHA loan for my primary residence), and purchasing another MFH with an FHA loan in only my partner's name.

As your primary residence, you should purchase the best house you can afford with your kids education and extra curricular activities in mind.Problem with SF public schools is the lottery system, but that's a whole other discussion.

I am hesitant to call this one my first "deal" for two reasons: (1) I haven't closed on it yet and (2) the circumstance of absolutely needing a residence to live in took precedence over taking my time to find a killer deal with concrete criteria.