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BTW I registered for two sections only... good thing!
J
If you stick to a plan, are diligent, and have a review program even remotely worth its salt, you will do well.
Don't cut corners and don't slack off and you'll be done with this in a year.
...for what that's worth from a corner cutter and a slacker. ha.
Keep in mind that every time you have to re-order your NTS it is 50 dollars. I selected the first 2 without reading the fine print, passed them in a month, then felt robbed that I had to pay again and wait over 2 1/2 weeks only to hit blackout month.
I don't have a family nor a full time job so my odds to pass are far better than another71's so depends on your situation. I can't afford financially to not pass since i'm in debt. The job I was interning for fell through due to the darn economy, so there went my immediate reimbursements for CPA stuff.
Just adding my 2c so people are informed.
Keep it up another71. I read every week or so.
As my quote goes:
"I don't really know where I am or where I am going. I just know where there's a beginning there's an end. And a story makes up the whole mess between."
Inko
Well I'll be.
I just learned something. I paid $238 for REG today and just went and looked how much the exam cost was on the NASBA site and it says $170-something. I guess I never realized the $50 fee for each NTS.
Hmmmm...well, I see Inko's point, but I still think that 2 at a time is the safe way to go - that way you have the freedom to quickly retake a section if you need to.
I don't think I would feel comfortable getting an NTS for 3 or 4 sections. $50 is $50, but it's...10 lattes (I buy quad-shot lattes, so they're $5 :) )
I actually just sat for the REG test a couple hours ago (and I'm here at work, what kind of nutcase am I?) - this was my first experience and it really wore me out. 3 more to take before Oct.. yippee.
I did want to ask, how long does it usually take to hear about results? Also, how heavily weighted is the Written Comm portion of the Simulation? I totally gave the wrong answer to one of them and it's got me all worried....
Thanks for a great blog!
I'm always mentally drained after an exam...yes you are crazy for going back to work.
If you sat today, you can pretty much bank on getting your results online by August 15-20th. - somewhere in there. The wait sucks.
Find your state at NASBA.org and see if they release scores online. You'll need your section ID and DOB.
The written comm. is 10% of your grade and they grade for content and quality of writing. Rumor has it that they only grade one simulation. Even if you wrote a bunch of garbage for an answer, as long as you dressed it up and used correct gramm(e)r and spelling, and tossed in a "wherewithal" or two, I wouldn't worry.
3 more sections before Oct? That means you're going to sit for 3 sections in August? September is an off month. I bet you meant by the end of Oct...(end of August...Oct 1st...end of Oct) ?
Congrats on taking your 1st exam!
I ended up staying at work for 2 hours and got the H out of there. I couldn't even formulate an intelligent conversation.
I'll hope for my scores on August 11th - happy birthday! YOU PASS! Oh, and I'm in CA, I didn't see anywhere on that site where I could log in?
I plan to take BEC at the end of July, then I'll do AUD at the end of August, and that leaves all of September to study for an early October FAR test. I'll either gain some motivation in all this or seriously burn myself out. The tests are paid for, I might as well at least sit for them; no point in letting that go to waste.
And damn, I forgot those wherewithal's!! FAIL.
It takes about 2 months from the time you mail away the forms until you get your NTS. Then the NTS is valid for 6 months. That is a total of 8 months of preparation for for 4 exams. That's 2 months per exam, more than enough time for preparation.
I applied for the NTS in January and got my Becker material at that time as well. I immediately studed for FAR at that time because I wanted to take that exam first. I got the NTS in March and scheduled FAR in April, AUD in May, REG in July, and BEC in August. So I scheduled 2 exams per window for 2 windows total.
I studied for FAR from January to April and got a 92. I studied for AUD from April to the end of May and got an 88. I studied for REG from the end of May to the beginning of July. And I just started by BEC review.
The bottomline is that registering for all 4 parts will save you money, and let's be honest. The CPA exam is not that hard!
You spent 4 years in college or 1-2 years in grad school so you know at least 90% of this stuff. So it's just a matter of reviewing it.
If you put 2-3 hours of study time per day 6 days a week and practice all the multiple choice questions at least twice, you can pass the exam! The CPA exam is not particle physics or rocket science, just accounting, tax, law, auditing, and business concepts. You don't need to be a genius to pass.
And do all of yourselves a favor, buy Becker! It is the most comprehensive review service and has hundreds on top of hundreds of CPA exam questions and simulations to review. If you put the time and effort into it, you can pass.
So I suggest that you minimize your cost and maximize your experience by registering for all 4 parts first. Even if you put minimal study time in, you could very well pass any or all of the exams. Like I've said, you know this stuff already through college!
But I am between a rock and a hard place. My audit section expires in the middle of January. But that isnt the only time constraint for me. In the state of VA I have to pass my last two sections (REG and FAR) by the end of November or I will have to go back to school for additional credit hours to meet the 150 credit hour requirement (I was grandfathered in for a couple of years). The real silly thing about it my extra credit hours can be ANYTHING I want. I can take a simple English class or how about golfing?
So yeah, heres to hoping that I will be able to pass them by the end of November. REG has been a struggle for me and I do LOTS of tax work where I work.