I understand this is predominately a real-estate financial forum but I was curious to get some opinions regarding a Research Analyst position for a tenant rep brokerage. Some questions are as follows:
1) Would it be difficult to find CRE financial exit opportunities as a research analyst?
2) How hard would it be switching from a research analyst to an investment sales analyst?
3) Besides analyzing your market and leases, what other duties would be required of a research analyst at a tenant rep brokerage?
Anyone who has more questions is welcome to post. Anybody who has experience transitioning or is currently a research analyst, any feedback is greatly appreciated.
My first job post college was doing this. It was a good way to learn about the fundamentals of the industry and build a network with brokers but it was extremely difficult to get out which is why I wouldn't reccomend it unless (a) you want to get into leasing brokerage or (b) you have exhausted all other entry level opportunities.
1) Would it be difficult to find CRE financial exit opportunities as a research analyst?
It would be very difficult. There is absolutely no financial analysis or deal level experience you would attain. You will be populating databases and running CoStar reports, maybe helping put together tourbooks/surveys.
2) How hard would it be switching from a research analyst to an investment sales analyst?
See answer above. The only way to do this would be to become close with the investment sales team in your office and hope an opportunity opens up.
3) Besides analyzing your market and leases, what other duties would be required of a research analyst at a tenant rep brokerage?
There is a chance you would be involved with business development/identifying tenant rep leads, which can be fun. You might be coming along on property tours, or tasked with writing white papers on specific market/industry trends. Other than that, you will be gathering and maintaining data, using your data to help create presentations, pitchbooks, or reports.
Thanks for the response, threw some SBs at you. I had 2 more questions:
4) Besides transitioning to a broker, what would the next logical step be if you wanted to 'move on up' company hierarchy?
4 a) When talking about the difficulty about exiting a research analyst position, what makes it so difficult? The lack of deal making & financial experience or something else?
5) What would compensation look like roughly?
4) Besides transitioning to a broker, what would the next logical step be if you wanted to 'move on up' company hierarchy?
Well the "logical" step would become a senior researcher, perhaps a financial analyst on the tenant account/portfolio side (those opportunities are rare). But from my experience, most researchers are groomed to become leasing brokers.
4 a) When talking about the difficulty about exiting a research analyst position, what makes it so difficult? The lack of deal making & financial experience or something else?
Yes - lack of deal experience and financial analysis. There's literally nothing to talk about in interviews that would be relavant besides your passion of real estate and understanding of fundamentals.
5) What would compensation look like roughly?
I would expect $40-50k depending on your COL area.
4) If you didn't want to become a broker, you would probably progress up the research department doing more market based research as opposed to property and tenant.
4 a) Lack of financial knowledge is probably correct, you will know a ton about the market though and could probably leverage that along with some self taught modelling skills.
5) Comp depends a lot, probably like $45k - 60K depending on how hot the team is.
It's notorious for being a pigeon-hole of a role. I personally passed over several interview offers for these opportunities while holding out for a development/acquisition role and while it took me a while to land one I don't regret it for a second.
Unfortunately, I do not have the experience or credentials to hold out for either of those roles. My only CRE experience are 2 CCIM classes.
Ideally, I would like to head in that direction, but right now, it doesn't seem realistic.
That being said, if you had 1 option, between tenant rep or research analyst, which one would you pick?
I'm still eyeing investment sales as well but those are my options as of now.
Which brokerage?
Big ones like: CRESA? Savills?
or a small one?
I worked for a franchisor's real estate group right out of college. Most of the job was setting up calls and meetings with the tenant rep brokers and franchisees. Also ran reports on potential sights. Had to do some calls explaining the real estate process with potential franchisees. Also had to go work the booth at all the different ICSC shows.
I worked their for a year before getting an analyst job with the internal research group of a large REPE company. I think I just got lucky to get that job though, as I just applied online and got an interview. I am now an associate here.
What do you guys think about a market research internship position? Currently a rising senior looking for an internship, and I've seen some listings for that. Looking to go into acquisitions/development in the long run.
The one thing I would add to the discussion is that you may find yourself doing basic cash flow analysis if the firm is small enough. In my experience, brokers enjoy pawning off their ProCalc runs to the researcher because they can sometimes find it tedious. This allows you to get some experience - albeit VERY surface level - with some cash flow analysis and software.
If its a bigger firm and you're interested in that, talk to the brokers. I'd imagine they wouldn't mind so long as they can get around any red tape.
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