Houlihan Lokey Minneapolis office

It's a very good group with high quality deal flow. I've seen plenty of analysts move to HFs and distressed shops from the office, both locally and to Chicago, San Fran, NYC, etc. Hard to compare it to a less prestigious shop in those markets, but the training and name brand will obviously be better than working at a lesser group. The advantage to the others would be networking and relationship-building, which is obviously harder to do from Minneapolis.

City is great if you like the outdoors and like to be active. Known for its lakes and running/hiking/biking trails, it offers plenty of good beer and food. It's not Chicago or NYC obviously when it comes to those, but it is underrated in many respects (as plenty of Tier 2 cities are).

Culturally, it is more similar to Seattle or Denver, but with less homeless clogging up the downtown streets. Weather can be brutal, but May - early November are solid. There are good weather periods before and after, but they are sporadic. If you don't mind the cold, there are tons of people always out running, cross-country skiing, ice skating, playing hockey and generally even walking around in the winter.

If you get HL and live downtown, there is a good chance you can use the skyways and never have to go outside. I've known a few analysts that never even bought winter coats.