Either way, I don’t recommend buying anything here in CA without an owners title policy, too many things can go wrong and the savings do not outweigh the risks.

Assuming they are legit the reward out weighs the risk

You want to do this to ensure that the time and money investments of operating a short-term rental outweigh that of a long-term rental.

You could do it over time and be at a point where you can refi to not take a monthly hit, but at some point it will outweigh.

Not a great house, but not a bad house.Was thinking of throwing an offer out there, but I don't know if the potential issues outweigh the numbers, etc.Any thoughts?  

There are so many potential mistakes you'll make getting started that the losses will far outweigh the gains.  

However, if there are some lenders out there, does it seem like a decent idea to pay the fees just to put some 'cash' offers out and grab a deal at a discount that outweighs the cost of points charged? 

However, I'm not ruling them out entirely and might even welcome the idea of more units if the pros outweigh the obvious con of managing more than one unit with little to no experience doing so.

I expect at some level the pain of managing the properties/tenants has outweighed the profit for the owner.

My theory is that the risk of losing the $100 just doesn't outweigh the cost of getting title insurance and going the traditional route.