You did not indicate if you were paying PMI and insurance in your payment, but assuming you are not you have an equity pay down in excess of $1300/month. 

I'm currently looking into mortgage shopping and am doing a lot of research into the topic, and I then hit a thought that has caused me to hesitate: should we all put our names on the mortgage, thereby legally spreading exposure and allowing us to combine our resources (cash reserves, credit scores, etc.) or should one of us apply for the mortgage. 

Just picked up the excess tax list for my city!!!

As a potential seller of your home, do you value the almighty dollar more and go with a discount broker or do you feel fully paid commissions for name recognition and big brokerage exposure is well worth it?

The GL policy will cover most, if not all of the risk exposure you have from tenants, but make sure you read carefully the policy itself.

It allows you to put it on the market with the most exposure to drive the most interest.

Keep in mind that as you develop your portfolio, you may not want a lot of equity build-up; using your equity to purchase additional properties and limiting your exposure to claims against your estate are two basic reasons to not have a lot of equity build-up. 

Excess rental losses are carried over to the next tax year.

Basically it is excess land he wants to just trade for something.

So the idea is to constantly learn to get better and better where people seek you out by reputation and it's not about the commission but the ongoing working relationship.Sometimes if a seller wants excessive marketing one strategy is too have the seller pay for the upfront marketing and if it sells the broker/agents gives back the marketing cost amount at closing (verified credible receipts of course).