The loan officer says everything checks out and is ready to write me the approval except my DTI is artificially high and told me I need to figure out a way to prove that it is lower.My only debts are my car loan, my student loan, and my rent.

Other than that, they don't come around to check.I had a SFR rental  tenant complaining about a neighboring house rented to roommates, they often have friends coming over to play cards, park their cars in the public street in front of our SFR.

I owe nothing on student loans because I worked my butt off during those 4 years and only owe about $8500 on my car with a few other small debts like a 0% interest computer loan and a credit card with a balance of $500 on it I want to buy home rather than rent because there is no reason to pay a mortgage payment every month and not receive anything in return other than a roof over my head.

Lol That is like a used car salesman telling you to not check the car history.

And generally, people living someplace want similar things (a parking spot for all cars, laundry on site if possible, a dishwasher, etc.).Also, if you're going to live there for a year, you can take your time checking out the rental competition during that time, to see what's "standard" for the area and then make some of your decisions on that basis.Lastly, my understanding is that the 6% non-resident withholding is only an amount withheld from the sale to ensure that nonresidents actually file their RI taxes for the tax year covering the sale.

I've used down payment coming from the (improbable) cash-out refinance on a car. 

Be extremely carful with your efforts to accommodate this tenant, it could become extremally expensive for you.

I travel a lot and it helps me to educate myself on specific topics while in the car or plane. 

Might be a year away yet, building those reserves and getting my own financial footprint reduced (might knock out the car payments first), but we shall see. 

Henry Ford said "you can have any color car as long as it's black".