I plan to invest the proceeds in an Opportunity Zone (personally) to defer my taxes.

@Alfred Dimartini any time someone asks "what loan should I choose" I would defer with the answer of "what loan are you prequalified for?" 

However, OZ benefits only accrue to investments of deferred capital gain equity. 

So two questions:1 - Can I buy the house as an individual using my using capital gains and defer the taxes, or must I create a QOF to purchase the house?

Account ClosedThere're various options when it comes to tax deferral. 1) Syndication may certainly be one, however keep in mind, the depending on which syndication you'd want to invest, your clients may need to bring somewhat of a substantial amount into a syndication in order for deal sponsors to consider structuring it as a "TIC" for them.2) Another option can be DST - Deferred Sales Trust. 

The capital gain I am planning to defer was from a personal account where I sold equities.

It’s highly probable the costs to maintain the property and to catch up on all the deferred maintenance and capex exceed the gross rent.

A lot of the properties in this area are quite old, and many have deferred maintenance issues. 

Figure out what all your expenses are, figure out what your repairs costs are, deferred maintenance, etc and you can calculate the property value (via cap rate).  

@Reid Isaki, I'm trying to understand why you would want to keep accumulating losses when you can defer the recognition of gain indefinitely?