My thinking is I could offer a piece of the new property in return for 15k cash and a strong financial statement however my goal is to have next to no personal rent expenses can anyone give me some ideas?

For example at what stage of your life and or what financial position you are in does the cost make sense to protect your families assets?

With this strategy I think I could hack financial freedom by 30 and retire by 50.

In Maine, it's very common for landlord supplied heat simply because heating oil and winters can be so unpredictable that both lower income tenants AND financially savvy blue collar tenants lean toward "heat and hot water included".

One good startegy is to BRRR (or better BRRARR) a property - the financial sustainability of the approach over the life cycle of the investment is usually not pointed out sufficiently - a fully improved property will yield higher rent and require little money for repairs and maintennace in the first 10-20 years.

I’m no financial advisor but it seems like a good time to take your chips off the stock market table.

Do you have a seasoned LLC or are you counting on your FICO plus target financials and forming a LLC during the deal?

Unless it makes sense both financially and personally to live there and move out after a year (which is typically what owner-occupy loans require.)As @Buckner Toney pointed out, multi's don't make sense to house hack. 

I want to use these two homes to start walking my way towards financial freedom, but don't know which path to take.

If they can not afford the equilivant of a months rent deposit they definatly can not afford the apartment due to very poor financial planning.