RCLCO Thoughts?
Hello WSO Fam -
Hope everyone is having a good summer. Have an opportunity to connect with folks at RCLCO, and wanted to get some insights.
- How is the company culture?
- What is the company's reputation in the industry?
- Is this a good place to learn?
- How well does this skillset transfer to other specialties?
- What advantages does working here provide that you wouldn't get elsewhere (capital markets or principle side)
- Anything of note about leadership?
Thanks in advance!
Limited interaction, but the two or three people I met both seemed very smart but arrogant. Consultants who seemed more focused on showing how smart they were rather than executing deals.
Probably not a bad place to learn a lot, but not sure how smoothly the exit to a development or acquisitions seat would be if you get pigeonholed.
I would rather hire someone who cut their teeth at a brokerage rather than a consultant to join my investments team.
I worked there a while ago, so some of this is stale, but I keep in touch with a few people there. They split the company into Fund Advisors and and Real Estate Advisors? Which are you talking to, or both?
Thanks, this is great. Speaking specifically the Fund side. Can I DM you?
Yeah sure. Again, it’s been a while, but happy to help where I can.
One thing you need to be eyes wide open about. The business model of RCLCO is effectively this - asset managers, acquisitions guys, and developers pay you to validate their ridiculous assumptions. You are effectively trying to back into an analysis that justifies what your clients want so they can use that to sell to lenders and LPs. I think it'd be a good place to learn for a couple years. But I would not want to do that long term.
Worked at a similar firm in the space and this 100%. Lots of deal exposure which is great but it’s a lot of ‘narrative building’ vs. hard analysis. That said, I worked on a bunch of engagements with the biggest names in CRE which was great early in my career. It’s a tricky pivot out as well in terms of exit opportunities, you don’t have transaction experience, you might not have direct underwriting experience, I pivoted to a operations focused MF asset management role but that was a tough needle to thread.
Read the IAPD.
Thanks, John. Is there something specific I'm looking for on the IAPD? From an outsider, it looks more like regulatory/compliance docs.
Apologies for the delay, in the IAPD, it shows their AUM, who owns it, investment strategies. I would look at the AUM.
Ditto what Larry David and CoffeeBong said. I did my MBA internship there. I learned everything I needed to from their platform in those 8 weeks. Once you've done one of their apartments studies and understand the mechanics of their models, you're basically just doing a creative writing assignment on justifying why this building is different from the others and why it deserves top rents.
Hours definitely aren't 8:30 - 7:30 for the real estate advisors, maybe the fund guys are different. Definitely had some hardos who really bought into the consulting mission.
It was very hard to stay engaged, I could do the work in like a quarter of the time they gave me and didn't need to continuously review it with my boss even though she was like it's an iterative process. You'd need two rounds of edits at most, I could do the job in my sleep. Didn't get a return offer lol, I was literally quoted "He's good at the work but doesn't seem interested in being here" in my end of internship review. I don't disagree with the assessment.
Thank you, this is helpful. Can I DM you?
Sure thing
Can only imagine how easily AI could generate their reports with all the previous work product to learn from.
I'll chime in with some color on the RFA side since most experience discussed above is REC. The RFA guys do everything from direct investments & coinvestments underwriting to fund underwriting to strategy recommendation. I know a few people there well and while I personally find that work interesting, it is best transferable to another advisor or a sophisticated institution (pension/endowment). Reputation is good for those skills but again there is little to no sourcing your own deals and you don't get in the weeds near as much as the GPs - which would be a plus imo, you don't have to spend months a year banging your head on the wall on deals that never pencil. The client book is interesting too, working with Asian pensions, MENA sovereigns, and US pensions.
It is a great place to learn real estate as a whole, despite them having house views I think you're encouraged to have a view of your own on the sector/market/deal etc. Lots of real estate guys are getting their first education in the cyclicality of the industry right now and I think seeing it from the 30k foot level serves you well in a career. Jaded take perhaps, but I feel most real estate guys discount how much their deals live or die based on macro conditions outside their control.
All told if you're planning to use it as a stepping-stone to a GP it'll be good but not great, but in-and-of-itself and related to other paths it is a great job.
Thanks, kylejackson -- it's helpful to hear from the RFA side. Can I DM you?
Does anyone know what the analyst/associate case study is like? making me use a lockdown browser for it
I interviewed there a long time ago, but my case study was done in person after a second or third round. I was handed a laptop disconnected to the Internet with a T12 and a rent roll loaded on it and a print out of an OM. I was tasked to model the deal with a waterfall and answer a handful of questions about the deal in an executive summary format. I was given either 45 or 60 minutes and they told me “we don’t expect you to finish, we just want to see how far you get so be prepared to explain your workflow and thought process.”
The fact that I had to do it on a laptop was the hardest part as I was used to a proper keyboard and multi-screen setup.
It was pretty tough and I ultimately accepted a different job before getting feedback on my work, but it kind of left a bad taste in my mouth. Hardo interview practices like that are a red flag to me.
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