Why do the treasure hunters seem to be so inept? When you find them, they always only seem to have a few coins and maybe a ring or necklace on them. A lot of the time they are in an obvious trap.
Do they belong to the Treasure Hunters for Idiots Guild? LOL

Treasure hunters. You mean Adventurers? Hold on...I gotta look on UESP.

I found this page on Oblivion > http://uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Dead_Treasure_Hunter. Since the treasure hunters are deceased in this case, there's your answer. They weren't very good at their profession. I'm not even seeing a listing for living treasure hunters.

Occasionally in Oblivion we can find an http://uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Adventurer, which are living NPCs in search of 'adventure' (even though they hardly move anywhere).

You aren't by chance talking of Skyrim > http://uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Treasure_Hunter_%28NPC%29? Are you? If so, you're in the wrong forum.

You won't be finding the competent ones, will you?

Ha ha yea, good point. The competent ones are all our other characters.