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The Real Estate Financial Modeling Interview Exam Guide (Udemy.com)

How To Ace Your Real Estate Financial Modeling Interview Exam For Real Estate Investing Careers

Created by: Justin Kivel

Last updated August 2026

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What you will learn

  • Real estate financial modeling exam strategy, what employers are looking for, and how to succeed on interview day
  • How to use the most common Excel functions and functionalities to analyze real estate data and calculate returns
  • How to model cash flows from commercial real estate leases (and re-leasing scenarios)
  • How to solve a real estate financial modeling case study and build a dynamic pro forma model from scratch in Excel

How it compares

Against the other 75 rated Udemy courses in Real Estate on CourseDuck:

  • Rating4.8 out of 5higher than 80% of them
  • Reviews1,217#21 of 76 by number of reviews
  • Length10.1 hourslonger than 82% of them
  • Last updatedAugust 2026more recently than 68% of them

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Course Description

Want to land a six-figure job in real estate private equity, brokerage, or lending?

This course will teach you the core fundamental Excel financial modeling skills necessary to land one of these jobs and succeed in your first (or next) role in commercial real estate.

The career opportunities in commercial real estate are huge, with top-tier salaries and bonuses, the ability to invest directly in deals, and opportunities to participate in fees and promoted interest as you progress within the industry.

But with that said, breaking into the industry for the first time is not easy, and many firms want to know you have the skills necessary to take on a role before extending an offer.

In today's competitive hiring market, writing "proficient in Microsoft Excel" on your resume won't cut it for these roles, and the best firms (the ones you actually want to work for) will often test your real estate financial modeling abilities in a case study exam format.

This test is usually the last "gatekeeper" for the most coveted private equity, brokerage, and lending analyst and associate roles at multifamily, retail, office, and industrial investment firms, and this course will give you the tools necessary to ace that exam.

Please note that this is not a course for absolute beginners, and if you're brand new to Excel and don't have a core understanding of real estate finance, this course likely isn’t for you.

However, if you have the basics down already and you're applying for jobs and/or preparing for interviews at top real estate investment, brokerage, and lending firms, this course will make sure you have the skills and the confidence necessary to be able to pass a modeling exam with flying colors, and ultimately land the job you're looking for.

If you're ready to jump in, I'd love to see you in the class. And if you're still on the fence, here's what some of our students have had to say after completing this course:

★★★★★ "Unbelievable value for money. It feels like I just accomplished an MBA in Real Estate Finance."

★★★★★ "Justin is a very clear instructor who can explain complex topics and formulas with ease. I have learned a ton from all of his courses and hope to use them to enhance my own career path! I highly recommend this course for anyone who is looking to sharpen their excel / real estate financial modeling skills and break into real estate investing."

★★★★★ "This course greatly helped as a refresher when interviewing for a large institutional Lending position. It also enabled me to be much more efficient in my modeling."

★★★★★ "Justin's classes are very clear and he drills the parts that you need to know continuously. It is also helpful that he continues to say the keyboard shortcuts so that you remember them."

★★★★★ "Awesome. Great way to end your programme of courses. I feel like I've definitely gone from a from scratch beginner to probably at the advance intermediate stage now. Many thanks for all your help in putting all these videos together!"

If you're ready to build your real estate financial modeling skills to be able to tackle any questions that come your way on interview day, just click the "Buy Now" button to get started, and I'll see you on the inside.

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Instructor Details

Justin Kivel

Master real estate financial modeling, advance your career, and earn more money.

If you’re an aspiring real estate investment professional looking to break into the real estate investment field, or a current real estate professional looking to advance your career and increase your compensation, you’re in the right place.

My name is Justin Kivel, and I’m a real estate investment professional with a love for teaching. Throughout my career, I’ve worked on over $1.5 billion of closed acquisitions across multifamily, retail, office, and mixed-use properties. I’ve had the opportunity to work with some of the brightest minds in real estate investing and have spent almost a decade in the industry across private equity, finance, and brokerage roles.

Unfortunately, most of what I know today I had to learn on the job. Although great courses exist on Microsoft Excel and financial modeling, I couldn’t find a resource that was specifically tailored toward real estate investment professionals that would actually walk me through exactly what I needed to know to succeed in the real estate investment industry.

These courses are that resource.

After dozens of phone calls and coffee meetings with college students and aspiring real estate investment professionals, I realized that most people were asking exactly what I was asking when I was in their shoes.

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Reviews

4.8

1,217 ratings on Udemy

Select a bar to show only those reviews.Select the bar again to show every rating.

By Nicholas Lillig on 7/8/2024

Justin, this course is absolutely perfect. I recently got my master's in real estate and have been applying for jobs left and right. I bought this course to help me prepare for an Excel exercise that I took yesterday. I completely and it was because taking Justin's course jogged my memory. I'm now flying in for an in-person interview with a high profile Denver-based private equity firm because of it. I highly recommend it, and actually I'm only through the first case study and 70% done with the course!

By Helene Barthel on 6/12/2023

I would have liked it to have additional explanations of the different numbers and how to interpret them.

By Ashish Bhore on 1/3/2022

This was more like a revision for me as i have enrolled for Justin's other courses. I really want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for this amazing content on CRE interviews and expalining what the employers are looking for. After taking this course i feel like I'm ready for CRE Interviews. Blessings.

By Skylar Staib on 11/23/2021

This was a fabulous course! The content was very helpful and insightful. The teaching was very well done and thorough. The layout of the course is very easy to follow and the explanations are very well done. I am so happy to have found and taken this course to help me prep for my upcoming commercial real estate interviews in the future. This course and the information it provided me was exactly what I was looking for and what I wanted to help me succeed in starting my career in commercial real estate. Huge thank you to Justin for this course! Wonderful job!

By Alexander Mazur on 10/1/2020

Fantastic course overall. I've taken a few of Justin's courses and you can't go wrong taking any of them, he's a great teacher and really does a great job explaining all topics from beginner to advanced. His courses have helped me land a financial analyst job at a REIT.

By Andrew Killion on 7/22/2020

Very good prep course. It covers a lot of topics and functions. It's good for those looking to prep for an interview exam or just to brush-up on financial modeling. You would get more benefit by having some knowledge of Excel and financial modeling because the lessons in this course are presented at a quick (but thorough) pace.

By Lorenzo Butturini on 5/4/2020

Explained pretty well and for beginners rather than intermediate I would say. The only thing I did not like is how you model Debt Service. You do it by using formulas like PMT, PPMT and so on, but in my opinion it is better and especially more helpful to calculate manually rather than using the formula, cause you better understand the logic and how the formula works. Besides deeper understanding, you also are able to eventually manipulate better the formula. anyway, great course, very helpful, perfectly explained and taught, you touch all the topics you might face in an interview, you talk clean nice and with no mistakes 5/5 for sure!

By John Calhoun on 8/30/2019

An amazing course that gave me great insight into what it will take to ace the real estate financial modeling interview. I highly recommend his other courses as I have coupled a few together and the modeling work is starting to make sense faster and become more automatic. Great job!

By Chris Stein on 3/10/2019

Justin is a very clear instructor who can explain complex topics and formulas with ease. I have learned a ton from all of his courses and hope to use them to enhance my own career path! I highly recommend this course for anyone who is looking to sharpen their excel / real estate financial modeling skills and break into real estate investing.

By Matthew Overton on 12/29/2018

Hello Jason, This was a great balance to your other courses that I have completed. There were quite a few new formats, formulas and financial metrics presented here too. Once again some repetition for reinforcement and this was complemented by new information as well. Fantastic Thanks Matt

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Overall Score : 96 / 100