[Broag]

I passed REG with a 79 this morning. Quite the relief. GG. Now I’m heading on to the next game…..FAR. I’ve been studying for it for a little over a week now. What was your mindset right after passing a part of the CPA exam? How did you apply that mindset to your next part? How do you not get over confident while still knowing you can pass this beast?

Any suggestions/tips/advice on taking out FAR is much appreciated. I have Becker and Ninja MCQ.

REG - 79
FAR - ?
AUD - ?
BEC - ?

[Anonymous]

I think you're already ahead of the game if you have passed REG and are already studying for FAR. I unintentionally took a solid 3 months off after passing FAR before beginning to study for REG. If you don't stop studying, it is easier to keep going than it is to make yourself restart after stopping. I think the one thing you will notice about FAR as compared to REG is that it feels like a lot more information- because it is. You really do notice the extra two chapters, in my opinion. That being said, I think its very do-able. I did FAR over about 2 and a half months. I watched all the Becker lectures, did all the Becker homework, took notes on my whole Becker book and used Ninja for sims (which I didn't do more than 2ish hours of prep for total), and for supplemental MCQ. I basically didn't study F10 at all, and I still got a 91 on the exam. I think if you really try to understand the concepts like how leases and bonds and pensions work and why etc, it becomes a lot easier to get your way to the answer and to do the SIMS. Doing Becker, I think you start to memorize answers rather than actually learning. Also, governmental and not for profit (F8 and 9) are significant on the test including sims so if I could go back I would have reviewed those chapters really early on and then just practiced them over and over.

[Broag]

91 is a pretty darn good score. Now let me ask you this…I always see people on this forum saying to write out your journal entries for every MCQ possible…how can you do this efficiently? I mean, how do you know your journal entry is actually correct. I feel like knowing my JE's will help me pass this part. Trouble is, JE's aren't my strong suit…at all. How did you go about JE's?

REG - 79
FAR - ?
AUD - ?
BEC - ?

[Mamabear]

I wrote out JEs for every question, whether it was required to get the answer or not. If you don't know off the top of your head that the JE is correct then you can always post on here and ask or possibly google to find out. I highly suggest getting involved in the study group on this forum for Q4 FAR. Our FAR study group was awesome and really helped me understand concepts that I thought I knew, but didn't.

I also practiced JEs from these two websites:

https://sites.google.com/site/farnotes/gas-34/journal-entries–fund-based-vs-government-wide

https://www.principlesofaccounting.com/illustrative%20entries/entrieslist.htm

CPA Exam - Finally DONE (November 2014)
BEC (08/10/13) 80
AUD (08/24/13) 65 (11/13/13) 85
FAR (04/12/14) 81
REG (07/19/14) 69 (11/29/14) 87!!

[Broag]

Thanks Mamabear. How do you join a study group? I'm somewhat new to the site. I feel like I'm going to ask some pretty dumb questions when it comes to JE's in a study group LOL.

REG - 79
FAR - ?
AUD - ?
BEC - ?

[Mamabear]

If you look at the top of the forum there are currently study groups for Q3 for each section. It is essentially a thread dedicated to that section in that quarter so you are with all people going through the same material you are. Once Q3 is over, Jeff will pin the Q4 study groups up there. If you go back and look at Q2 2014 for FAR you will see how incredibly active we all were and most of us that participated a lot passed on the first try. It may not be your cup of tea, but it helped me a lot and it was always nice to be able to post a question and have a discussion until we all got it.

CPA Exam - Finally DONE (November 2014)
BEC (08/10/13) 80
AUD (08/24/13) 65 (11/13/13) 85
FAR (04/12/14) 81
REG (07/19/14) 69 (11/29/14) 87!!

[Anonymous]

The study groups are stickied at the top of the forum. Just jump into the section you are studying. Introduce yourself and read what other people are saying. Don't be afraid to ask questions. That's what they are there for. One word of warning, they can be a bit discouraging at first because of the questions people are asking. That's normal though. People aren't likely to ask “what's an opportunity cost?” in the BEC Study Group. Instead they are getting stuck on the more obscure topics so that's why the questions can seem a bit scary at first.

As far as transitions went, I didn't overthink it. I took my exam on a Friday or Saturday. I'd give myself no more than 3 days off and then just jump into my next section. I knew that the longer I waited or put things off that the harder it would be to get started. I also didn't want to lose motivation or let the study skills I've developed start to deteriorate.

[Broag]

Very cool. I'll join when Jeff posts.

Knocking out that first exam really makes you realize how FAR you have to go.

REG - 79
FAR - ?
AUD - ?
BEC - ?

[Author]

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