I got my acceptance to Clemson's MRED program about a month ago, but have been hesitant to pull the trigger on it. My main concern is the cost (55k for 18 months). I'm just not sure if I can justify taking on that much debt without having a better idea of what entry level pay is.
I've been told by some of the program's staff members that entry level compensation within the Southeast (Atlanta/Charlotte/Greenville) is about 80k; is this accurate? Assuming that the information is accurate, how quickly does compensation increase? I know that compensation in real estate development isn't as black and white as some other industries, but I would really appreciate some guidance.
Step 1) Ask for a list of alumni who attended the Clemson MRED (you can get this from admissions or by doing a little digging on LinkedIn, etc..) Step 2) Request brief informational calls with said alumni and ask these questions; trusting a school's website (particularly for unranked programs) is great but it is critical to do your diligence on this decision....you only want a program that will help you get to where you want to go. Alumni are the ideal people to speak with...where are they working now? What were their first jobs out of the Clemson MRED? How was placement in general for their graduating class? What types of jobs did people get? Did all their classmates get jobs?
Good luck--if you follow the above, you should be in a better position to make a decision!
Internship and job ops range from the best in the country to ones you kind of shake your head at. I interned at a top regional developer whose name you would recognize and some people I know interned at national REITs, at international companies on the corporate side, and with developers of all shapes and sizes. There are alumni on Greystar's development team, with the Rockefeller Group, with Amazon, with USAA, and a number that run their own shops. There are also alumni at some local and regional developers. That's mostly based on personality and prior experience - real estate is very much a networking-based industry and there are only a limited number of actual listed positions to apply for.
As far as the price tag, that's hard to answer because I think higher education pricing is bullshit throughout the spectrum, but it is far more cost effective than say Johns Hopkins' MSREI program or UNC's MBA program, which were two of the others I was targeting.
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Its easier to go from commercial to residential than it is to go from residential to commercial.
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I couldn't disagree more with this statement. Not everyone is going to become a developer from "flipping properties on zillow". You don't learn how to build a property from the ground up by flipping properties. MRED programs now-a-days are providing backgrounds in the legal, finance, and construction environments as well as giving you the key relationships that you need to be a developer.
I'm not saying you can't become a developer from flipping properties. It's definitely a good way to build relationships. But discouraging someone from getting an education in the field of real estate and telling them to risk their youth and career on a whim of "flipping properties" is ignorant.
First of all, love Atlanta - great city.
I have to disagree with your assessment though. Studying the residential market and learning to flip properties on Zillow is great experience if you want to be a single family house flipper, but flipping single family houses has so little to do with class A ground up urban infill development that they might as well not be in the same industry. A MRED is not a golden ticket by any means, but to act as if you can learn everything there is about the industry by flipping single family homes is as laughable as thinking that flipping single family homes makes you a developer. You can come out of these programs and be an "excel junky" but you definitely don't have to and you can learn to deal with contractors and organize financing without having to take personal risk, which is a more intelligent way of going about learning.
Finally, it's "you're." You learn that kind of thing at school.
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