[Hosmer]

Just finished AUD, now on to REG. Three questions:

For those who have passed REG, what do you wish you knew before you started?
How would you have changed your study plan in retrospect?
What’s the most useful piece of advice you got for REG?

My current plan is to stick with the “watch Roger videos, do thousands of MCQ’s” approach, which seems to be working so far.

One million bonus points to answers specific to Roger study materials.

[habitual]

I just took REG on Wednesday, and I don’t know if I passed or not. I don’t think I did because I didn’t feel fully prepared. That being said, I knew what I needed to do to pass and I just didn’t put in the time like I should. The one piece of advice that I can give you is to not overlook BLAW, in SO many places I have seen people say not to focus too much on it and its only 20% of the exam…. But I feel like more like 30-40% of the MCQs were BLAW related! I did not spend much time at all on the BLAW portion, and now I am seriously regretting it. I have my fingers crossed for a pass, but if I don’t get one I will definitely know how to study next time.

So many questions looked familiar to me and if I would have taken the time to really hammer MCQs I think I would have felt 10x better about the test. Go through the chapters and understand the MCQs and you will be good. And don’t overlook BLAW and ethics!

(I am using Becker, but I think that the MCQ approach is pretty universal)

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

The exam is weighted 63% Tax, 20% Business Law, and 17% Ethics

Most of the time on REG all of the sims are going to be tax related. In some rare cases you may get 1 sim on BLAW or Ethics. With that in mind and the fact that the exam is 60% MC and 40% sims, you should expect two thirds of the multiple choice to be Business Law and Ethics questions, and one third tax.

So in total, you'll see around 48 Business Law/Ethics MC questions, and 24 Tax MC question. All of your sims will be tax.

My advice is to make sure you really really understand the tax portion of the exam before moving on to Ethics & Business Law, bc the tax portion is much harder to understand and remember and much more complex in nature than Ethics or Business Law. This does not mean you should skip either BLAW or Ethics. You won't pass unless you cover both Ethics & BLAW.

BEC 08/31/2016
AUD XX/XX/XXXX
FAR XX/XX/XXXX
REG XX/XX/XXXX

[JRM]

PRACTICE SIMS!!

[A]

FYI, the new REG exam is 76 MCQs (old was 72) and 8 SIMs (old was 6), weighted 50% MCQ and 50% SIMS (not 60:40) with the following content breakdown:

10-14% Ethics, Professional Responsibilities, and Federal Tax Procedures
10-20% Business Law
12-22% Federal Taxation of Property Transactions
15-25% Taxation of Individuals
28-38% Federal Taxation of Entities

The best piece of advice I can give is KNOW YOUR CORP and PARTNERSHIP (inside/outside) BASIS!

I had no significant tax experience and half-assed it through my only tax class four years ago. I also used Roger book/lectures and did about 4,500 Ninja MCQs – I passed on first try.

B - 77 (2.27.16)
A - 81 (4.18.16)
R -
F -

Roger Review + Ninja MCQs

[Peasqueezy]

Practice as many Sims as you possibly can. Especially if they are confusing. I use wiley and they have a phone app for mc questions, so when I wasn't studying I was taking exam questions. Several hundred every day. I just took it last week and I didn't have a problem with the mc but the Sims were really tough. I did all the wiley Sims and about half of the Gleim sims and I definitely left the test scratching my head. Practice using the AL as much as you can. Good luck!

[Anonymous]

I wish I had taken Corporate Tax in college. Only Individual Tax was required, and I wanted nothing to do with tax at all, so I never took it.

Know all the tax topics and be able to do property basis questions, and then practice Sims as much as you can. I bomb on sims and during the exam I usually forget property basis rules and corp/partnership basis rules. I'm always rushed or in a hurry to sit for the exam, so I don't put in enough time and practice. That's why I keep failing REG.

[ThomasHallberg]

It is an estimated 20% business law. I recommend NOT sweating the business law questions. Focus on tax, master tax, crush tax, eat and sleep tax. Business law is something that you can skim a few days before the test and wing it. Usually with the law questions you can reason with the answer that is the most fair. With the tax, which is 100% of the SIMS and MOST OF THE MCQ questions, you either know it or you don't. 48 law questions as mentioned above is completely wrong. Try 5-20 MAX

[QueenCPA]

Know thy Basis!

[krstnam]

I'm not sure how helpful this is, but I skimmed the tax and focused on law but I worked in tax, mostly partnerships and estates. It seemed like there were quite a few questions on estate tax. Way more than I would have guessed based on the estimated amount of material Becker seemed to cover. when I left the tax industry, I never thought that knowledge of real estate professionals and passive activity loss limitations would ever come in handy but go figure…

Other than estates, I thought I had a lot more questions in law-I covered UCC very thoroughly and was glad I put in extra effort there. Its hard to say though because the pretest questions really put a monkey wrench in things.

[Author]

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