Dolly says, “Can you give me study tips on preparing for the tasked-based Simulations for the FAR exam?”

We get a lot of questions about Simulations. And, I recommend doing 70% MCQ, 30% simulation. Some people think it's 60/40, I don't. 70% is the max. I mean, you can't spend half of your time doing Simulations because you know that you're going to get, whatever, 70, 80, 90, whatever the breakdown is amongst each exam. I don't have it memorized, but you know that you're going to get tested, over each concept a little bit. And then, you're only going to get a handful of Sims.

You need to master the content, or at least to an acceptable level, 80%-ish, from the MCQ to be good enough for exam day. Again, you're going to get a handful of Sims. You can't just punt the Sims, because, if you punt the Sims and then you fail, you're going to blame it on punting the Sims. No, you don't want to do that.

But you should definitely do the AICPA sample test, and get familiar with it. But, I recommend 20 to 30% of your time, max, on the Simulations. I would do Simulations, over what I call your bread and butter tactics. I don't know if bread and butter is a Midwestern term or what, but, over your basic topics. Inventory, bonds, leases, just stuff that you can take to the bank that's going to be on the exam.

BEC, okay, so, what's a big topic in BEC? Cost accounting, alright. Regulation, individual tax, partnership tax. I mean, stuff you have to know, do a Sim over it. Don't do a Sim over some nuanced topic. But do Sims over your basics. And I think using that rule of thumb, I think that will serve you well on exam day.