So if you paid off your mortgage, would the remaining expenses such as property taxes, insurance, and maintenance fees "keep you up at night" instead?

Most of them are still motivated to sell.

Then if you have any remaining entitlement eligibility, you could use that to buy your next place that you would live in.

However, I know it isn't that quick, so I will remain patient.Thanks again.

That would leave your 20k repair budget 15k profit, 10k for closing costs, carrying costs, and the remaining as a contingency for repairs.

If they are doing periodic price drops that is a good thing as it may indicate that they have some motivation to sell it ... in that case, I would see if there is a pattern to the price drops, as in they are dropping $10k every 3 months or something like that ... if that is the case you can time your offer as the price gets closer to a good deal, put it in just before they would normally drop the price, but a bit lower than what you suspect they will drop it to.

That would effectively drop your down payment to 4%.This is likely only going to work with a small, local bank, and a seller who's pretty motivated and/or business savvy, though!

I've read through CA taxation code, section 3172, and it seems that the only encumberances that would remain attached to the title would be government encumberances, judgement liens, and mechanics liens.

The guy is highly motivated and detail oriented.

Reduce the price so that you'll pop up again on the MLS, and it'll show potential buyers you are motivated to sell/willing to negotiate if necessary.