Anyway, i work a crummy dead end job, and have no formal education after high school.

Most dogs in this category do have formal training and documentation, but proof of this is not required.

No formal training. 

Lucky you haven’t been burned by not knowing that.However, as others have Said, a sheriff sale is a judicial foreclosure so a second can’t bring a foreclosure to auction with the first given notification at which time they would have a inferior claim.

., with respect, New York State has a Unified Judicial system site:  https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/webcivilLocalL/T cases are always available and can be searched by plaintiff or defendant, searchable by county and other criteria. 

Seller is not experienced in the process and did not hire an agent for representation.I sent in a formal contract offer. 

I assume this would require some sort of formal parcel/lot split with the city if it were allowed, anything else that would need to happen?

Lay it all out together then go see an attorney to formalize. 

Is it mostly formal written communication?

I still got an inspection done though, just to know what problems I had to formally address - can't let the sell fall through at the flip.I don't think that I'd remove it for most deals though, so my example is the exception to the rule.