Lowball offer, worth taking?

Hello everyone.

I just received what I feel like is a lowball offer and would like some advice.

Background: A little under a year of experience at a valuation firm. Non target university.

Offer: Small (under 10 people) Tech M&A boutique in San Francisco. The offer is 80k salary and a 30-40% bonus for what works out to be 105k-115k total comp. My bonus is also delayed; I wouldn’t receive my first bonus until i’ve been with the firm for 18 months. The bonus at that time would only be paying me for 12 of those months. Until I received that bonus, i’d actually be taking a slight pay cut from my current role.

The reason the offer stings a bit is because i’ve turned down valuation offers that would have actually paid a higher total comp for far fewer hours. Given the recent IB pay increases across the board, my total comp would be equivalent to base salary alone at a larger firm.

My end goal is tech corporate strategy. I’ve been hoping to break into IB for the incredible experience/exposure but this offer just seems a bit too low. I’m a little worried about turning the offer down because i’ve heard from a number of other firms that they’ve paused their lateral hiring due to macro conditions. I don’t want to miss the boat. Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!

7 Comments
 

I literally just cold applied. They are more middle market, so if you're expecting bb ib, you need to be big 4.

I'm middle market tas ( RSM BDO, GT). Though honestly I do think the hours in ib is trash, I love my hours at my current firm. I just wanted to test the waters. I think corporate banking is a happy medium of pay and wlb.

 

The IB comp increases you’ve been reading about sometimes don’t trickle down to these small, esoteric boutiques, these guys can kind of do whatever they want.

If you’re not obsessed with breaking into IB by any means necessary, turn down the offer and try to get into a legit big place.

You have a year of experience which can balance out your mediocre college and valuation centric experience, so try going for first year analyst openings where your competition will be seniors in college who were not able to secure an offer during their junior summer internship.

 

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