I heavily agree on all counts, but I'd like to point out:
1) I think instead of 150k per upgrade, the preferred status cap should be raised to 500k and have each upgrade be 500k, since I just KNOW they'd make the price high for the upgrade, may as well get a good amount from it.
As to #2, is that really a subscriber only thing?... Well this will prove annoying when my subscription dies out.