Looking for career in CRE

Hello,

First time poster. I want to pursue some a career in real estate but I am just not sure what I want to do or what jobs are available to me. 

To give some backstory on me. I am have been an accountant for a property management company overseeing about 30 properties. The company work is a developer and we build, manage and sell the properties. We partner with many big names like blackstone but the people I work with in those companies are all other accountants. We have a sales and acquisitions department in our company. It's small. Less than 10 people. I would love to get in there but in the few years I have worked here we haven't had any openings. I am pretty friendly with everyone there. I haven't had the opportunity to see exactly what they do day to day but I know they visit properties, find deals, underwrite deals, etc. When I am on websites like WSO these jobs sound so much more intense than our operation.

Where I am at now. I have a degree in business, some pretty basic finance knowledge and a few years of accounting in property management. I'm not sure where I go from here. Job titles out there feel very generic(analyst). The idea of helping buy and sell our properties sounds great but I don't know where to be begin looking. Is there anything in particular I should be searching for? Do I need to go and get an MBA or MSRE to go further in real estate? 

3 Comments
 
Most Helpful

So, for most people, working in accounting even when for RE firms, is still accounting and thus moving to RE is still a legit full "career shift". The most direct path from property accounting is into asset management, where knowledge of accounting is pretty central for day to day operations. If you can network with your clients, may be a path there. You could also move to become a property manager or assist within direct property mngt, it's path and you are close to it already. 

Otherwise, a grad degree (MSRE/D or MBA) could absolutely "reset" you while giving you the missing real estate and finance coursework required and help you understand the industry, network, learn to do modeling, etc. Larger firms increasingly require grad degrees anyway, and using it for a "career shift" in to a true CRE role is absolutely common for people in your situation. 

 

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