Getting licensed while sitting in a wholesaler group chat feels like a conflict waiting to happen

"My broker said don't worry about it" is the version of this that ends with a complaint to a state commission, because the exposure runs through your license and your broker's, not through the group chat.

The structural issue you've identified is real. A licensee generally owes duties that an unlicensed principal doesn't, and in most states those duties attach to how you're acting in the transaction rather than to which hat you say you're wearing. So a licensee who sources a seller, contracts in their own name as a buyer, and then assigns, is doing something a commission may look at differently than the same conduct by an unlicensed person. How that's treated varies by state, and some states require the licensee to disclose license status in writing when buying for their own account. That specific question belongs with your broker and a real estate attorney in your state, and you want the answer written down, not verbal.

On the three options you laid out. Disclosing on every deal is the least clever and the most survivable. It costs you nothing except some members deciding they'd rather refer to someone without the paperwork, which tells you something about those members. Restricting yourself to the dispo side reduces the seller-facing duty questions but doesn't eliminate them, because matching a buyer to a property still looks a lot like brokerage activity to a regulator if you're compensated for it and you're licensed.

The thing to check before you decide is what your broker's own policy says. Plenty of brokerages flatly prohibit assignments by their agents, or require every principal transaction to run through the office. If that's the case your choice has already been made for you and the group chat question is moot. Read the independent contractor agreement you signed, specifically the clauses on outside business activity and personal transactions.