If it a occupied property and lets say the town you are buying in needs transfer stamp then you may have issues. 

People are so well off as “poor” they sell their food stamps, section 8 while spending 300$ a month on hair and nails.

Hello,I'm looking for an engineer in New York State to stamp drawings so I can get a building permit.

Just send a generic note to the old address with the notation on the envelope saying do not forward, address correction requested (buy a rubber stamp later).

Use some date stamp method to show this is happening often.

Can you lose your shirt in real estate making uninformed decisions?

That seems pretty easy to write up.....you get the exact pay off, set a price, you pay all closing costs, doc stamps, recording fees, etc. for the seller.  

“I don’t know enough to not lose my shirt”, “if this property is available , there must be something wrong with it or a more experienced investor would have already bought it”, “how am I going to make this work with my full time gig”, “hones are way too expensive in my home area, and long distance seems way to risky” etc etc.

Some states have high excise or transfer / stamp fees, so keep that in mind.  

@joshJosh, you might find a letter to the landlord is still worth a try, He sounds like a jerk but a stamp is all it's going to take to send him a response,, He's probably rented the place out again,, might be worth a heads up to the new current tenant about his tactics, Someone should stop him in his tracks.