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Hi all,
I took BEC, FAR, and AUD last year, studied with Becker, and passed on the first try. I took REG for the first time back in January and failed with a 67. I used Becker, and while it laid a good foundation for the material, in retrospect the multiple choice problems in Becker were just not complex enough (particularly the tax problems). I went through the problems so many times that I started getting used to the way that Becker presented the questions and tested the material. When I got into the exam, they’d throw a curveball in there that wasn’t presented that way in the Becker problems. Had I actually (really) understood the material better, I probably could have worked my way through the problem.
I re-took REG in May and supplemented my Becker materials with Gleim. I chose Gleim mostly because their test bank is $50. I just want to emphasize – I only used Gleim for REG, but after using it, I have to say it’s the most underrated study material. You don’t need to purchase their book because Becker does a good job of laying the foundation (so there’s really no need); Gleim’s test bank is just great for problem repetition (especially for taxation!!!) and the best part of it is it’s only $50. It presents the multiple choice problem in a completely different way than Becker – yeah, there are some problems in Gleim that are found in Becker, but for the most part Gleim’s problems weren’t the same. Plus, it is super organized by topic, so if I felt like I needed additional problems in AMT, it was easy to select that section only. Also, the level of difficulty is far above Becker in my opinion, and some people say that’s unnecessary, but it really showed me how much I understood the material (the level of difficulty was especially key for me in the tax topics).
My strategy was to go through problems in both Becker and Gleim (I spent much more time on Gleim problems because they were more difficult), and make flash cards of any little taxation detail in the answer to the multiple choice problem that I felt I needed to memorize. I went through all of the flash cards every day starting a week prior to the exam. Forget re-reading notes from the lectures, etc. – I spent the most amount of time just working through problems. You need to really get a feel for how the exam will word the different types of questions (especially tax questions) – which you can’t really get from just re-reading notes.
Also – just a quick note on the simulations. In both the exams I took, they were brutal and I’m convinced you will not be able to get through them unless you’re a professional in the subject matter. I walked out of the REG exam in May feeling really good about the multiple choice and terrible about the simulations (I didn’t know how to do ANY of them except the research tab – and I truly felt like I understood the material). I ended up getting an 87 on the exam – so I think this shows if you rock the multiple choice, you can get by doing really poorly on the simulations. This is why I emphasize the need to really test how much you know the material by doing the more difficult Gleim study questions! Don’t get me wrong – Becker’s not bad for REG, but if by chance you don’t do as well on the multiple choice, that puts more pressure on you to have to do better on the simulations. Put in the extra effort for REG – aim for the 90, not the 75! TRUST ME! 🙂
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