[Jayce]

It's always possible the new owner had someone help it along although it could have been a homeless person living it in, a random arsonist, someone cooking up some drugs, or just a carelessly flung cigarette. Most abandoned buildings like that don't have any utilities running into them anymore, so unless lightning strikes the building, the fire is man made.
I hear you on the asbestos remediation and it is way too expensive anymore and our country's love of putting it in everything has and is still dooming a lot of our older structures to demolition or the owner just lets them fall in on themselves. I guess if a building has to be torn down in an emergency removal, all that is required is to keep the structure hosed down to keep the asbestos dust down. At least around here that is how it is handled. And yes, cities in my area do that too. The wait until a structure with asbestos in it becomes dangerous then do an emergency demolition to avoid the remediation costs, though the emergency demolitions are getting quite expensive as well.