There is value for hobbyists. I have a cheap $20 or so LCR meter, I used it when I didn't have anything better, for seeing if my inductors were in the right ballpark, despite knowing that the test is not applying a known frequency signal; that's not the way those low-cost meters work. I still have it, and still occasionally use it, despite having access to better instruments. I sometimes (very often!) do not want a precise measurement, nor might I care that there's no specified accuracy for a $30 instrument. Often with uncertainty, I can live with it, it's part of normal life.
You can learn a lot by observing the change in value as you compress the inductor, or applying different materials close to it. You also can visually observe drift as the instrument warms up, learn your requirements for a better instrument, and notice the need for calibration, or zeroing, and observing the amount of change that occurs when the test wires are moved.
I don't think many engineers would use it to 'select' a component as the OP asked, and there is often no need either, since many circuits can be 'tuned' through voltages or other adjustments. But a $30 meter for observing some quite interesting behaviour for a beginner, and providing results that you may indeed need to verify in other ways (e.g. in-circuit running the end application and seeing if it works) for non-critical work, sounds like a very acceptable thing to do.