[Wingdings]

I took FAR today for the third time and OH BOY was it rough. My first attempt I literally took just to see the exam in person and got a 54. Second exam I was dedicated and busted my butt using only Roger, I got a 73. I was heart broken, but I took everyone’s advice and pushed forward. I continued listing to lecture until it was nearly memorize, and I got NINJA. At first I HATED ninja because it seemed to be so much harder than Roger’s test bank. But I learned to love it and I very much love the metrics that ninja gives to gauge your progress and proficiency.

So there’s the background, I’m through lectures about 3x’s by this point, 2,000+ MCQs, and hundreds of SIMS (these were my downfall in the 73 attempt).

So all that said, after today’s attempt I’m completely defeated! It was like I was there for the wrong section! The MCQ’s were not anything like those I saw on Q2, these seemed much more obscure. I still think I gave the MCQ’s a fair shot but didn’t submit the second quizlet with a smile like I had during the Q2 attempt.

Now on to SIMS, I was fully prepared for the first sim to be my research question as it had been on every previous attempt (FAR x2/REG x1). Instead it was 2 exceedingly long FS questions that ate up about an hour. I felt that I did ok on these two but that’s when everything went to hell. Fourth quizlet came and more exceedingly long FS questions. These were the million exhibits for no reason kind of questions. By the end of this quizlet I literally had 15 minutes remaining for the final 3 questions, luckily it was my research question to start (I’m normally about 99.99% on these) NOT THE CASE TODAY! This was the most obscure back of the book garbage question I’ve ever seen it took every second of the 15 minutes frantically searching every corner of the codification, to no avail! I couldn’t find it! So I essentially left 3 full questions unanswered on the SIMS and have very little confidence on the others and am so-so at best on the MCQs.

I’m very bummed. I’ve put a ton into FAR and thought today would be the day! Sadly I made a rookie mistake and let the clock get the best of me!

I can’t wait for continuous testing in June 2020! Then these missteps won’t sting so bad and I could be signing up for my new NTS in a few weeks!

Best of luck all!

[Andrew]

I never do well on Becker mock exams. I think I got something like 45. 53. 61. For the 3 FAR mocks. Usually averaged mid 50s-low60s for the other 3.

[Parker]

Took FAR yesterday and out of the four tests, boy was it a monster. Every question felt extremely detailed and time consuming. The sims didn't feel much better with a ton of spots to enter FS numbers and over 5 docs to review on every sim. It seemed way more involved than the other three tests. Praying for the best!

[Warrior]

@Parker Congrats!! I hope you did great.
What about questions? Do you think Becker nailed them all? Have you seen any question you being unprepared since Becker skipped those? Thank you

[Parker]

Becker definitely covered 95% of the questions I saw. Even for the many that I didn't know, I remember going over the concept in Becker. Just the vast amount of information to know, I was unable to figure out how to solve it haha

[jso49428]

I took FAR 3 days ago.

Overall, i thought the MCQ’s were easier than Becker. Even in testlet #2, which was harder than testlet #1, it was still easier than Becker for me (other than about 3 or 4 questions). Use this to your advantage and get through MCQ’s quickly, because…

Sims were tough and very complex. Harder than Becker’s. Each sim had 5-9 exhibits to pull info from. I highly recommend leaving at least 2 hours and 20 minutes for the 8 sims. Even the research question was not straightforward.

Gov&NFP made up about 12-16 of my MCQ’s

Thankfully, using my approach of 1.5 hours for MCQ’s and 2.5 for Sims, I was able to finish the exam in 4 hours.

Anyways, hopefully I passed. Now onto Reg…

[Warrior]

@Jso49428 Thank you for perfect advises.
@Parker Thank you a lot. I was choosing between Gleim and Becker but decided to stick to Becker. Now I feel good for making that decision. How many hours did it take you to prepare for FAR? Did you follow Becker study plan?

[jso49428]

I spent about 320 to 350 hours over the course of 2 months on FAR (using Becker). I understand this is may seem excessive, but I was studying full time and REALLY wanted to pass before I start my job in late August. Hopefully that paid off.

I literally watched every lecture and did every problem though. You could probably get away with skipping lectures and just doing problems. Especially when Tim Gearty is teaching. That guy is inept.

[baylor.bear95]

Took it about two weeks ago and trying to guess what my possible score will be before the 6th has been a exhausting. Immediately after i submitted the second sim testlest I realized I hadn't checked whether they wanted the empty cells with zeros or blanks. I had left them blank cause I was tired and thats what Becker usually calls for but I had forgotten the real thing is usually the opposite. Sadly the questions that I had overlooked that on were ones involving long columns of “zeros” so i've been dreading the possible score that gets posted. Overall I would say Becker along with NINJA prepared me well for the exam. The MCQs weren't horrible, but I did dislike the way they framed the NFP & Govt. questions compared to the Becker and Ninja ones. The sims were harder than other exams, but that was to be expected. And it isn't that they are necessarily more difficult rather just more daunting. Had i not made the leave them blank mistake I wouldn't be nearly as anxious about my score, but now I'm really sweating it.

[CPA1872]

@elkguy, what did you wind up getting? I'm waiting for FAR score this week (retake).

[Author]

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