This population collapse will be most keenly felt out past the city first, and the younger inhabitants will move into Allegheny County and Pittsburgh proper from communities like Kittanning and New Castle, Canonsburg and Jeannette.

Now as long as at the time of purchase you have the intent of inhabiting your unit as your primary residence and do not intend to rent it out, you are OK.

The big reason for not being ready is that I just made a huge life transition (active duty to civilian) so I am still trying to get my day to day life all sorted out.

Do you (or the PM) have any idea exactly how long the guy has inhabited the house? 

Hi Clifford,Are you looking for RTO properties offered by "civilians" (i.e., not investors), or properties offered by companies that specialize in this type of deal?

When someone else buys the building and wants to live in the building they can only inhabit that particular unit. 

I also want to be able to rent or inhabit either one if it is not sold within a few months, as I cannot sustain a vacancy in either for more than 2-3 months.

Do houses that are rented/inhabited sell easily?

You may not have been aware, but all you had to do to was negotiate a reasonably quick timeline with the PHA to make repairs/renovations to fix/replace the HVAC and assure them you would be meeting the letter of the law in proving other accommodations for the tenants during any time where the unit would not be inhabitable due to the work being performed.

Shaun:Once upon a time it was fairly common for side-by-side units to be built with a double wall, each faced on the inhabited side only with the cavities either empty or filled with paper-backed insulation (fibreglass, mineral wool or gypsum wool).