First off, I hope anyone reading this is staying safe and sane in these particularly chaotic times. While this post does not pertain to the current pandemic taking place, I think it’s so great that there are platforms like this that allow people to come together to navigate this unusual situation.
In regards to my personal predicament, I am absolutely certain that I want to make a career change that involves real estate in at least some capacity. However, I am quite conflicted in figuring out what that path should be.
I finished my master’s degree in accounting this past December and began working at a “Big 4” accounting firm immediately after. Although I am only a few months into my job in public accounting, I know that the profession is not for me. The firm and the people that I work for have been wonderful thus far, however, I do not find the work fulfilling in the slightest nor do I think I ever will. I plan to stay at my job at least through the rest of the year and will hopefully have my CPA license by then, but what I should do after that is something that I am constantly going back forth on.
I have had a strong interest and love for real estate and architecture for as long as I can remember. Scrolling through real estate listings is something that I have done daily since I was in middle school and had purchased probably 50+ house plan books even before then. My choice to go into accounting in school stemmed from me not being sure of what I wanted for a career and accounting seemed like a safe foundation to build a career off of once I figured that out. I was also somewhat concerned that pursuing a career directly in real estate would take the joy out of it for me and that I could perhaps fulfill my itch for real estate by pursuing real estate investing on the side. After working in the corporate world for a little while now, though, I feel confident that I want my full-time occupation to be focused around real estate.
One of the paths that I have been strongly considering is going to law school to become a real estate attorney. I think there is a potential for me to really enjoy that type of work as well as be able to leverage the expertise that would come from it towards my real estate investing endeavors. I should mention that I would only go to law school if I receive a considerable amount of scholarship money that would allow me to avoid going into a large amount of debt. Even then, I question if it would be worth sacrificing three years of my life or even all that beneficial for real estate investing. (If there are any real estate attorney/investors reading this, I would love to hear from you!)
Another consideration I have is to simply find a different job based around real estate with the accounting/economics degrees that I already have whether that be a real estate accountant, analyst, or even a real estate agent. If I go this route, I would probably keep the mentality of investing in real estate on the side until a day that it can hopefully be my full-time job, I would just hopefully be more interested in the type of work than what I am doing now.
I have also thought about somewhat of a merge between the two above options and trying to get into a law school that offers a part-time/evening program and working simultaneously as a real estate agent. I feel like there could be a lot of great experience potential with this that could put put me in a nice position one I finished law school.
At the end of the day, I really just want to find fulfillment in what I do and enjoy the the work as much as possible. I would greatly appreciate any input that you all may have. I know there are much more pressing issues happening in the world right so thank you for taking the time to read my post.
