Advice: Small firm with good experience or large firm out of college?
I am a senior at Florida State University (non-target, obviously) but have done my best to stand out despite being non-target. Triple major (RE, Economics, Finance) with a 4.0 graduating on time with leadership experience (president of a couple clubs). I have a full-time offer for when I graduate with a small developer in GA that, long story short, said he is looking to retire in 5-10 years and wants to teach me what he knows so I can run the firm when he retires. The problems are that
A. It's affordable housing development, which I don't want to do for the rest of my life (though the current owner says I can take the firm in "whatever direction I want" when I start running it, assuming I can make it make sense to him) and
B. It's a very small firm, only four people including me. We only do roughly three deals per year.
I definitely don't want to run a small firm forever, and I've been told by a couple people that growing a small firm like that is very difficult. I'm thinking about maybe doing REPE someday, definitely in a bigger city like NYC or SF.
What advice would any of you have for someone in my position? Does this sound like a conducive path to REPE?
I'm going to be a little negative so take it with a grain of salt.
Why would a seasoned developer offer to make a college senior his successor? Doesn't he already have people at the company? Take the large firm, but remember one in the hand is worth two in the bush.
All the other people at the firm are 45+ and have no interest in taking over. They've had interns in the past and had very negative experiences. He has a son but he also doesn't have any interest in the business at all. I've been told by the other employees that the owner thinks highly of me, and we've taken on a sort of mentor-mentee relationship. I've also worked as an intern for him for a little more than two years now. Of course, nothing is set in stone given I've not even graduated yet, but this is the prospective path he's willing to offer me assuming nothing changes on his end in the coming years.
Few things to think about
1) Do you plan on staying with this small firm 5-10 years until the guy retires?
2) If #1 is no, then can't you join the firm and leave in 2 years and try to recruit for REPE then?
2a) If #1 is yes, then if you'd want to transition, would you have to train someone else on how to run the firm?
3) Do you have any others offers at the moment?
There are many paths to REPE, some are more conventional than others, but on average, being with a large firm out of UG looks good on the resume. Not to say a small firm won't give you chances to succeed, it just helps with the larger firms simply because they and their services are well known. Personally, if you have no other offers, I'd take the development role and learn as much as you can from the old man. Maybe you will end up liking it or create a vision for the firm down the road. I mean, isn't it most peoples goal to have their own shop? You could seemingly do this by 30-35, so this really could be a great opportunity.
REPE jobs in NYC/CHI/SF aren't going anywhere. Get the best experience you can when you graduate and you will slowly work towards your end goal, whether you know it or not.
You don’t have the offer from a large firm yet do you? You can always come back with experience but u won’t always be able to bigger. Tel him you’ll come back later with offer in hand and tell him u want to bring tangible outside skills in 2-4 years and wants to be a part of the company but want to get the full picture before specializing and be able to add value from different skills than ppl have. Idk BS it but go big then work with this guy after.
Also ^^^ to other comment. What happens if he gives that responsibility to someone esle or is telling everyone else the same thing or he dies early whatever. Ur actually taking a huge risk even tho u have this opp guaranteed. Grind for a better tangible job then come back by CHOICE and negotiate some ownership structure when u come back
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