fortunately, there are enough nerds like us out there who have been willing to wade through the 10,000 pages of case law and statute. 

I am fortunate enough to have access to the VA loan and have a bit of reserves saved up for anything cosmetic needed or wanted before moving in and renting out any of the units but not enough for a substantial rehab.

Fortunately I am in a position where we do not need to optimize the revenue on this unit.  

Had the good fortune to be trained by my father Hal who also had decades of REI experience. 

This could be particularly important in Pittsburgh, because a lot of properties there are built on hillsides (and there's a lot of rain), both of which can cause foundation problems that can cost a small fortune to fix.  

When executed correctly and repeatedly, house hacking can be very lucrative, and there are multi-millionaires who built their fortunes on repetitive house hacking!

Its not complicated but there a lot of things to consider if you dont want to spend an fortune to go back and fix what you just put up.

Fortunately no one was hurt, but everything was lost. 

Agree with Dan and Zachary, there are a lot of options and it depends on how active of an investor you want to be.If you’re looking to take a more passive role in your real estate and want the benefits of diversification there are funds available to accredited investors that are designed to allow investors the opportunity for ownership of institutional investment grade property that is occupied by regional, national, and Fortune 500 credited companies. 

You're fortunate to be in the same state as the truly incredible @Michael Plaks, so you can have the best of all worlds.