I think the real issue with the SSTR is that it's had it's day. I did the FI route and then after having no joy at all, paid for the 737 TR and it all happened. I ended up with a job, and turning another down! The big issue here is that this was 2 years ago. It's become a victim of it's own success. In my course at GECAT of 8 students on the 737 and 320, all of us were placed or obtained jobs within 6 months. People saw it working, everyone jumped on the bandwagon and everyone saw it as the way in. Result being there was a huge amount of type rated people with no experience as more and more people paid for SSTR.
What do we have now? Well we have people now paying for line training to make them stand out from the crowd of SSTR people. It makes you think what next? Paying for enough line flying to enable your ATPL to become unfrozen??
I know the flying club i instructed with is desperately short of instructors. Instructing does lead to the openings you desire. In the past 24 months they have lost 5 instructors to jet operators, and 4 to turboprop operators, and 3 of them were in their late 30's.
Save your cash. Do the FI course, even if you can only instruct part time it will help your chances greatly