Mr. Real Estate Finance

Mr. Real Estate Finance: Emily here from The MBA Exchange. I agree with others that your story needs to be carefully crafted to be successful in the MBA Admissions process. Working with a consultant will help you to connect your past to your future and show where your goals can take you. It can also help you find ways to boost your extracurricular profile that you may not have thought of on your own. UVA is well respected by MBA programs, though the 3.0 will be below average for your schools. It could be helpful to show evidence that you can handle the academic rigor through an online class or to explain what happened in undergrad and why you will be a strong MBA academic. Please let me know if I can be helpful further: emilyb@mbaexchange.com. Good luck!

Hi, Mr. Real Estate Finance, this is Julie-Anne Heafey with mbaMission. You seem to have such a strong interest in real estate – is your tech move related to that, and/or at all linked to the app you are creating (is that a side gig, passion project, or part of your work)? I do think having a coherent story on your goals would be helpful, otherwise the pivot might be confusing. My bigger concern is on the academic side – a 3.0 is pretty low for Kellogg. Was there something going on in undergrad that is worth adding context to in an optional essay? Normally I’d look for a high GMAT to help counterbalance a low GPA, but yours is a notch below the average, so it’s more of a challenge. Despite your weaker academic side, I like your work experience (passion, a promotion and an international stint), so I’d give you just about normal odds for success at Kellogg, but I do recommend adding some backup schools outside the M7 to improve your chances of success. Some names there would include Cornell Johnson, UNC Kenan-Flagler, UCLA Anderson, NYU Stern, and Berkeley Haas… Good luck!!

Congrats on the recent promotion! What is going to be important in your application is to make yourself stand out from other finance applicants. I like that you have had both banking and PE experience – PE is a highly coveted job in general, especially out of business school and you could act as a resource to classmates looking to enter into PE. Your European experience will help enhance your profile. You will need to tie in your interest in tech product management – maybe this current project has given you insight into the possibilities with technology? Your goal should credible and ambitious – and with the limited information here I am not quite seeing the credible tie to technology. Also, Kellogg will be looking for your impact on the community and evidence of your leadership. For leadership, make sure you are talking about collaborative examples of leadership to cohese with the Kellogg culture – how have you led and lifted up other people. And I’d love to see more leadership in your community experience – could you take a leadership role in the Soup Kitchen you’ve been helping at? Overall, I think your odds are slightly less the the 25% acceptance rate at Kellogg. Your GMAT and GPA are slightly below average and so the rest of your application will need to be rock solid. Telling a solid story to explain your goals would increase those odds. I think that HBS and Wharton will be more challenging due to the sheer number of finance apps they receive. Good luck!