Public accounting to RE - Advice?
Hey all,
I posted on here several months ago looking for advice on how to break into the RE industry. Quick rundown on my background. Graduated from an SEC school with a double major in accounting and finance. Average GPA (right at a 3.0). Interned in the audit department of a regional accounting firm in the southeast. Turned down a full time offer from said firm in pursuit of something that wasn't public accounting. Through classes and partly because of the internship, I ended up discovering that I had a passion for real estate.
Fast forward almost a year, and I don't have a job. The accounting firm I interned for had an opening in one of their offices. Big city in the southeast (think ATL, Birmingham, Charlotte). Anyway, I needed a job, so I took it. Growing firm with a very unique client base: affordable housing. Most of our clients are LIHTC properties, but we also service HUD and Rural Development properties as well.
My long term goal is real estate development. I don't plan on getting my CPA. My plan is to use any time I would for studying for the CPA exam to instead study up on real estate topics, learn financial modeling, network, etc. I'm also looking into grad school in the future.
My question is, what would be a logical "next step" in my career path? What kind of jobs should I pursue to get out of accounting? Also, I find affordable housing to be interesting, but I would much rather work with market rate multifamily properties. I understand that affordable housing is somewhat of a niche industry, which could help me on the job hunt. I've also read on here that you can get pigeonholed to affordable housing the longer that you stay in that industry. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Former accountant/auditor here. I got my CPA and then left for real estate investments (REPE, REIT, Development, entrepreneurship, have a MBA as well). Took me about a year to get my audit hours and pass the CPA. Everyone wants to rush into things. You have the opportunity to work on real estate companies that you audit, that is fortunate. But for this time in your life, you are an auditor.
I’m biased but I want to see you come away from your Accounting education and audit experience finishing something. Get your CPA. When you say you want to study real estate while you are on the job, that’s not really something you can put on your resume, or at least not the same as you getting your CPA during your brief time in public.
You should get out of public, and soon so you can be an analyst somewhere. But get your CPA. You can say for the rest of your life you were a CPA before you got into real estate. Can help with future jobs and school. Helped me survive during the great recession being able to do the books for real estate companies.
As an employer I want to hire people who finish. I’m biased in favor of the CPA because I was in your shoes once. Try to learn from your experience with your clients, pass the CPA, finish off your year of audit, and then focus on the next. You have a long career ahead of you.
CPA struggling to break into CRE - please help! (Originally Posted: 04/12/2018)
CPA looking for your collective expertise! Apologize for the length of this - trying my best to keep it as brief as possible while providing all pertinent details. I'm an UGA grad with 3.7 gpa in Int'l Business and Finance emphasis (essentially, a finance degree with a language requirement and some international courses) and got my masters in Accounting at UNC after scoring a 700 on the GMAT. I worked at a Big 4 in audit for a couple of years before chasing the golf dream for a few years. I had gotten my real estate license during the golf pursuit because there was a genuine interest in the industry. After professional golf didn't pan out, I wanted to get into CRE, so I went to a national hotel convention. I was introduced to a guy who had started his own financing brokerage and was looking to bring someone on. Long story short, gullible old me bought into the promises of wealth of the commission-only position. After months of begging to learn the business so I at least had an all-encompassing handle of the service I was trying to sell and get some introductions to prospects, I realized I was on my own in both regards (virtually everything I learned about CRE financing came from me researching the internet). I left the company and just completed a short-term accounting consulting project to put away some money. My long-term goals are not set in stone, but my thought is that I'd like to be on my own someday, whether it's in single-asset/portfolio development, acquisitions, etc. I've always enjoyed finding deals and finding ways to make a lot of moving pieces come together to fruition. It's fun for me. I feel this is probably closer to a 10-yr plan than a 5-yr one, but at this point I'm just looking to get my foot in the door somewhere, bust my butt and get exposure to deal flow. I've applied to various entry-level positions at basically anywhere I can find an opening (different types of analysts at developers, brokerages, etc). I've followed up these applications with emails/calls. I've cold-emailed asking about openings and reached out to just about every real estate connection in my phone book, but haven't really had any luck. Any thoughts, concerns, words of wisdom, anything???? Much appreciated in advance.
Hi petec, any of these threads helpful:
Who will rescue this thread? @WallStreet18" Ryan-Golden @mossy695"
Hope that helps.
Awesome, thanks! I've looked through some of those, but not all of them..
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