I would advise you to do at least 2-3 family homes, take advantage of the FHA 3.5% for your multi-family, to use as little money as possible for your first transaction, with the cash flow of your first property you can save for the next property and so on. 

You'll have to pay for the new LLC and the closing, but quit claim transactions are pretty affordable.

@Philip Hernandez, this transaction does not necessarily have to be set up as the safe harbor TIC ruling of 2002-22. 

He bought one earlier this year and the broker made roughly $40k from the transaction.

A lot of people will probably jump in here from BP saying how you should be the tough guy in a transaction, but this is a seller's market...

Besides most wholesale approaches they teach are illegal in most states. 

You may be able to get a non-refundable option payment from the tenant-buyer and can potentially contractually lock-in a premium above the market value on the future sale, which may prevent you from losing money on the resale, if the buyer can actually complete the transaction at a future date.

Sam Zell, founder of Equity and the spin offs, was an attorney at a law firm, who handled a fair amount of real estate transactions.

If so, is it illegal?

I do all my transactions through McKillop Law Firm or Mason Title.