One concern my lawyer brought up was that if your original intent is to wholesale the property and not purchase it yourself, this is basically a glorified Listing Contract which gives you the right to sell the house.

Basically telling people they have the oldest one out there and giving you a $1000 discount.

Not just your relationship but you are basically starting a small business.

RDPD and Cashflow Quadrant are definitely good starts to getting yourself in the right mindset.A few other good books are: Richest Man in Babylon which deals with personal finance and basic wealth building concepts which is the foundation upon which everything else is built. 

He basically gave me every reason why i shouldn't get involved with real estate and I left that meeting feeling very discouraged.

To me that's basically a net listing and a smart agent stays away from that stuff.If an agent is purchasing off market properties from motivated sellers to resell they should always have written disclosures stating that they are buying the home for less than what it is worth and that they intend to sell it on the open market for a much higher price.

And believe me, I think you're better than most, but that doesn't make you worth more in providing a basic service. 

The deal clearly passes the 1% rule, it's actually a bit above 1.5% which I believe to be incredible in NJ.  2% is basically unreachable unless you find an absolutely killer deal.  

Originally, the basic ingredients to Lonnie Deals were, buy dirt cheap, use lipstick, double the price, rent to own it or carry the deal, when they couldn't complete the deal, take it back, rinse and repeat.

Basic question that has probably been asked a million times here....where should I go to apply for an FHA or 203k loan?