With your focus in using house hacking, Conventional or FHA loans would be your best options.

As a licensed realtor, I have some buyer clients looking to buy a house in New York state.

Live under your means and start thinking about investing in Real Estate.In your position the thought of finding a duplex to house hack, live in one side and rent the other. 

If you wanted to house hack I would stay where you are at and find one there.

Most old houses it is about 4 ft at the perimeter of the room, maybe less. 

For non-house hack deals, you'll need anywhere from 20%-30% as a down payment.

I have found that Redfin actually has pretty good search parameters to where you can look for listings that have been sitting a while that fit your buy box, and you can even do keyword searches for things like "as is", "investor", "seller financing", "guest house", etc. depending on what you are looking for.

There are risks too, when buying condemned and burned-out houses because you may not be able to control the environment where these properties exist.

Conversely, anyone can buy a random house in the midwest, underestimate capex, and... lose money. 

so the software that I use, "can" see inside the house by comparing photo between pre-flip and after-flip from house in particular neighborhood.