[Jaimcpa]

In terms of difficulty, what were your experiences? I’m just curious!

Lets try it on a scale of 1-10. Also, lets limit this to first time experiences only.

1 being “That was a joke.”

5 being “As expected.”

10 being “Nothing could have prepared me for that.”

If you are on either end of the extremes (or close), what was your current situation (recent grad, out of school too long, did not prepare nearly enough, did it just to see, etc…)?

Did your score resemble how you felt on this scale?

Thanks!

FAR- 73, 10/07/2013
REG- 8/31/2013
AUD- TBD
BEC- TBD

MAcc
Main: Becker Self-Study 2013. Supplements: Ninja / Wiley TB / CPAExcel (Bought before I received an offer).

[Anonymous]

I would rate the exam as a 7. Nothing is extremely difficult, it's just a lot of information. You really need to commit 3 – 4 hours a day 7 days a week to studying and do MCQs until you want to die.

I see your studying with Becker. It's a great review. I am 2 for 2. It was spot on with Audit. I felt it did a pretty good job with BEC, but I used the Wiley Test Bank the last few days to practice more questions and I feel like that helped me get 2 or 3 more questions correct on the actual exam. I think that you will also find out that the Becker questions are a lot more detailed than what you will see on the actual exam.

I am on to REG now and Becker is doing a great job, although I may do the same thing I did with BEC and supplement it with the Wiley Test Bank the week before my exam.

Good luck with your studies and hang in there when it gets tough.

[soxfan866]

The MCQ will be comparable to your study materials, but probably slightly less difficult overall. Nothing can really totally prepare you for the simulations, so that's why everyone just says keep doing MCQ. As was mentioned above, the exam isn't really extraordinarily hard overall, the amount of information is what makes it hard. With that said, there will be MCQ and simulations that you will be totally lost on, but those are few and far between. It's also important to remember that there are quite a few pretest MCQ and one pretest simulation on each exam (these don't impact your score at all).

You'll find that it's really hard to tell how you did when leaving the exam. There are exam experience threads somewhere, which can be a good read if you're curious about what to expect. It's going to be across the board though with people who felt like they failed getting 99s and people who thought they killed it sometimes failing. Bottom line is that if you failed you should be able to tell why. The easiest way to fail is to not take studying seriously (i.e. skipping sections you don't think you'll see).

I am a firm believer in Becker and think that it is sufficient on its own for all four sections of the exam. Sometimes it's overwhelming because theres a ton of material and often small details. However, if you stick to what they point out and just keep doing MCQs you'll be fine. You start to pick up on what's most commonly asked in the MCQs and I think that helps in narrowing down the important material.

As long as you give yourself enough time, study the important stuff, and don't take shortcuts there's really no excuse not to pass, in my opinion. Don't psych yourself out by worrying about the statistics. If you're not convinced that you're going to do better than at least 50% of the people taking the same exam as you, then you probably didn't study hard enough!

[yeo34th]

I took FAR, AUD so far and taking REG 1 APR 2013

I would say difficulty rate of 8 will be fair for CPA exam.

Its not extremley hard or twisted, it just covers a lot of materials.

You should focus more on getting basic questions right without making simple mistakes rather than spending time on very difficult questions.

For simulation, If you know your material pretty well then you will be able to get at least 70-80% right regardless how problem is structured.

[Getting a CPA]

Been out of school for a while, and have been studying FAR for a few months now.

I thought it was a 10 because of everyone telling me how hard it is and how I won't be able to pass it (ahhh loved ones).

I would say 7.5 to 8 now. I think I will pass all parts eventually, but how many retakes? I hope none 🙂

[henryv]

For me, it's 8. Reason being are:

1st: the volume of study

2nd: the randomness of the exam

I study from scratch since I studied IFRS/ISAs and different laws in another country. There are some similarities in IFRS/ISAs, but it's better to assume that nothing is the same as I might miss something. If it is not due to this circumstance, I could give it a 7. I could grasp BEC since I think it has the same scope w/ what I've studied.

FAR - 92 02/2013
AUD - 90 05/2013
REG - 85 10/2013
BEC - 80 12/2013

I'M DONE. THANK YOU LORD!

[Author]

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