Hi all,
I saw a thread from a couple of years ago on what to study for CBRE's FCG's finance test. I am taking it later this week and wanted to revive the thread. I will post what was on it once I take it. For the time being, has anyone taken it within the past year or two?
They told me it's pretty basic to make sure I have a base level set of finance skills. They said it's to be completed just on paper with my financial calculator. No excel. They said I'll be tested on cap rates, TVM problems, NPV, IRR, debt calculations. I've got everything down pat studying/practice wise except I am trying to figure out in what way they may test me on my debt calculations like the angle of an amortization table, DSCR, levered vs unlevered cap rate? Any thoughts?
Much rather be over prepared for this! Let me know if there's anything else I should study just in case. My role would be servicing a industrial investment sales team (I prefer to not fully disclose where because it'll give it away)
Thank you!
Also they told me they're glad I didn't take the Argus Enterprise Certification. The MD told me it'd be a waste of my money and they prefer to teach/mold me to their style with using Argus. If that helps anyone that's on the fence about dropping the $1,000 on the course for this type of role at this firm.
I did the certification and honestly after working in the biz now for about a year, I think it wasnt worth it.
Anyone????
I'm confused about the role - you're "servicing" an industrial investment sales team? But you aren't an analyst on said team?
It sounds like you're pretty well prepared so I wouldn't stress. I've never heard of CBRE FCG so curious how this works - are they basically pooling all their analyst into a single resource pool so the sales neanderthals can do their thing unencumbered?
I interviewed for a role there several years ago, and yeah that's pretty much it from what I understood. They have a bunch of excel/argus monkeys grinding away on valuation models day in day out. They also do third party consulting as well, but most of the work is billed internally to sales teams trying to win work.
So I am technically on the FCG team and my salary gets paid by them but I do the work for the industrial IS team. I got an 80% on the test and the IS team interviewed me immediately after. They said that although I'm on FCG they see me as part of their team and will give me a bonus ranging from 25-35% of my base my first year. FCG also pays me a bonus ranging from 10-15% of my base my first year. I got a verbal offer from them, they said written offer letter to come this week. I'm pretty pumped.
Got it, sounds like FCG has more to do with accounting and in practice you are basically an industrial IS analyst.
Congrats! 35%-50% bonus is pretty juicy for an IS analyst.
Coming from someone who recently left an FCG team, I can tell you that your role is essentially that of a calculator for brokers handling only the aspects that go into the financial analysis slides of an OM. It’s a desk job, primarily creating Argus cash flows that are dropped into an institution model that has been in place for years. You’re not truly part of a team; each FCG group has several different teams (primarily investment sales) that utilize your specific teams services. As a result, you essentially work as a pool analyst for various teams, each specializing in different asset classes. While they don’t directly work with external clients, they instead bill brokerage teams for the hours they spend underwriting deals.
Hey Mef, congrats so far! Mind sharing how you studied, or what was on it? I’m taking an written exam for a financial analyst position at JLL soon I assume it’ll be similar concepts.
Thanks! I took the test and did well on it and accepted the job offer that came about it. So they tested me on amortization, payments on a NNN expense reimbursements on a pro rata share basis (I didn't study for that and messed up on that section lol), NPV, IRR (levered and unlevered), PV discounted monthly, FV compounded monthly, calculating the cap rate. All done on your financial calculator. Good luck!
Hi Mef,
did you have to take a writing portion as well?
I plan on taking it soon and was wondering what content was on it. The people guiding me through the process say that it's strictly an excel test which may be a little different than what you took if you took the one mentioned on the original post. Thanks!
how did the analyst test for JLL go? Do you remember what they tested?
Hi mef,
I'm actually taking the financial literacy test next week and would love to know what resources you studied/took a look at to get those skills down pat.
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