I think the delay by operators in accepting the airframe as a freighter is two fold.
1) waiting for the residual values to come down to a realistic point for P2F conversions.
2) Operators accepting Airbus's plan to lengthen the nose gear mounts so when the A/C top side was being loaded, the deck angle was reasonable enough to do so by hand.
While this fix allowed Airbus to keep nose gear assemblies common through out the fleet, I believe performance is going to suffer from the "nose gear blister" gear doors.