] So now the eagle-eyed board monitors will want to know modern American practice has to do with JA; when JA's father died, the family had to move out of the rectory with not much more that the clothes on their backs. If the family had been allowed to purchase their home outright, they would have had SOME equity or capital when it was sold.

It wasn't a good example since the Austen family happend to leave Steventon several years before Jane's father died. But you may still be right. The problem is that the next vicar(or rector) often couldn't afford to buy out their predecessor. I think the the reason for the system was just that. I have the impression that money was the main problem for most of them, even for the Austen's. And those who could often had more than one incumbency.
Mr Austen had both Steventon and Deane for many years, but still needed to borrow money, wich he had some difficulty to pay back.
That Edward Austen was adopted by the Knights was really a stroke of luck for the family. Much had been different if that hadn't happened. And one can speculate over how it had gone with Jane's novelwriting and whether she had got anything published.
But perhaps being poor had spurred her even more to write to make some money.

Leif G-n