Research Orlando fully. Depending on where you come from, multiple things might be more expensive (home insurance, car insurance, groceries) while for us the cost of housing was less than were we were. Traffic is busy here. Try to choose your home where you do not have a long commute. It's easier to drive farther to the parks than to work. It's easy when you are in the Disney bubble to forget all those life things that are outside that magic sign. The rest of Orlando is NOT disney but full of people who are visiting and don't know their way around yet drive very fast.
Wanted to answer some specifics.
Don't park at DS to go to a park. You get parking at the parks included with your AP. Just park at the parks and ride the tram.
Popping in for dinner is awesome, but in reality more time consuming than you think. Traffic, parking, lines to get in, all eat up time. Calculate that in for your ADR. You will also discover that you can get ADRs day of or day before when people cancel. As long as you are not trying to get something for a huge group or on a holiday, you can probably get it. The only one I haven't been able to get was Sci-Fi on Vetern's Day Sunday. Tried multiple times and finally gave up. I haven't tried the Castle or BOG, as been there done that.
FP. As an AP you can have 7 days of FP scheduled. This annoys me. I go a lot. I want more. But I don't know what is "fair". All the locals can't hold multiple days of FP just in case, but I wish there was some way to have more if you are actually going that often. My problem ran into staying on property and only having 7 in 60 days. This seems to have resolved itself somewhat. I have learned to "save" one of my 7 to play around with in case we want to go for the day. I've also gotten much better at shifting FP on the go.
Basically, you'll adjust and find a strategy that works for you. Also, realize that just like once a year visitors you have to take into account the really busy times (Christmas/New Years) that you normally think about, but also the minor holidays that locals and Georgia/SC residents take advantage of long weekends to come (Columbus day, Vetern's Day, MLK and Presidents weekend...MLK and Presidents weekend are so awful we only go one day...I'd rather do Spring Day any day than MLK and Presidents weekend).