PCM - Pass First Try- What I studied for 2 months
I passed PCM last week. Total study time probably wound up being 6 months however 4 of those were just getting through all the content out I had.
After getting through all the content I narrowed down what I actually needed and studied that portion and did practice exams and finance problems for 2 months. This schedule was getting up at 530, work by 630 studying until 8 and then working till 4 and studying from 5-8.
To save some people from studying everything under the sun here are what I would recommend to get/study as well as what helped me
Books
I used AHPP, and I definitely highly recommend you to buy and read it but not for the sake of studying.
It is very in depth and will give you a great foundation on thinking through what you are studying but If you study this it will be a week of reading and no application just to leave you stuck reading and reading and reading to try and condense down.
If you want to read AHPP for this section then make sure to use http://narmourwright.com/wp/index.php/wiley-publishing/ AND https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4BvCc3nt7PsNFVialI2WFJWNVU/view for reading guides.
Instead of trying to study about AHPP for ~1k pages you can use the following (use the book for getting more in depth knowledge on the topics your weak in)
Study Guides
Their are at least 2 study guides available on here ( did not find a link in the first few pages but go through this PCM forum and you will find them! - if i find it I will add it) were invaluable for condensing down the info into something to really study as this is a very broad exam in content, I'm really thankful to the people who created them! I recommend picking the one you feel works better for you and thank the creators!
Tatyana Aksamentova notes/ study guide
There is one that is more in depth than this one that I used however could not find it if you would like I have it saved in my google docs so I can send it to anyone who wants to try it.
Contracts
If you have never read the contracts I recommend taking a week and going through the Schiff Hardin lecturers they are great but super difficult to just listen to for me. In reality I did not use the info I received from the lectures to study rather they explained the basics of contract law and how law suits with contracts are looked at.
If you want to really study the contracts I recommend
- Printing the Draft versions and read through it
- Making a short hand version paragraph by paragraph - what is this really saying vs all the lawyer words
- Write word for word key clauses like Indemnification or the basic services
- Study this short hand version
If you want my version I can link it however I recommend the word for word key clauses and to redo it for yourself. What I remember in my mind is different from what you remember in your mind
To easily remember your AIA Docs
a Contractor B Architect C consultant
The hard ones to remember are A701 and G701 below is how I remembered them all
A101 Owner Contractor - Stip Sum
A201 Gen Conditions. -
A701 Instructions to Bidders Think A is for contractor 701 is for number of contractors, why do you have 701 several contractors? They are bidding so they need your instructions
B101 Owner Arch
C401 Arch Consultant
A305 Contractor Qualification Think the 70's business man has A contractor 5 is Jive so check his qualifications
G701 Change Order G7 is 7 Grand of change orders
G702 Certification of Payment Give me 2 dollars
G703 Continuations Sheet 3 = sheet
G704 Substantial Completion 4 out the Door
Delivery Methods
Hyperfine Architecture - had some great diagrams of these, I used them along with the chart you can find in this post : https://are5community.ncarb.org/hc/en-us/community/posts/360035087193-PcM-Pass-Materials
for understanding these however make sure to use the study guide info too.
Ask your Project Managers about situations or questions you have on these.
Finances
Hyperfine Architecture - Its $50 with the finance workbook, made me really go through thinking finances and how to calculate them Without this I would not have gotten any finance questions right. AHPP was impossible to understand. This will help you a ton.
Make sure to memorize your ratio's and understand how to read and go through RFP's and Creating your own proposals as well as understanding your office finance. I recommend talking to your Project Manager, Principal or Accountant depending on the size of your firm to help walk you through these
Ethics
Make sure to read NCARB Rules of Conduct
All the other items are covered in the Study guides and you should be able to delve deeper into each of the areas they cover.
Practice Exams:
I used Designer Hacks for exam practice questions, started with the 10 questions and took them until I got a 100 on one. Then went to 25 question test until I got a 100 and then did the mock exam till I got a 98. This gave a good foundation to understand what areas I was knowledge in as I would get to a question and have no clue what the answer was and then I would study that content more.
The CDS practice exam from Kaplan for the 4.0 test was awesome for more realistic exam questions over Designer Hacks but both are way easier than the real exam its mostly wording being way more difficult. If you do not have this resource or can not find it reach out to me in this thread I have it and answers.
Other resources opinion:
I did not use any of the other resources but I did create a spread sheet of all the resources listed on this forum that people recommended and the consensus seemed to be that
Black Spectacles is over priced - it gives you a super broad overview of questions and the interface for problems are similar to the real exam but not in content- most reviews said that if you use it alone you will not pass. - if your struggling to grasp a concept it might be worth it but I would prefer to ask my boss or finding a study group over shelling out that much money.
AHPP is the most recommended however as stated above I would not use it to study unless you have several months of study time
Ballast Review Manual 5.0 - This is almost worthless in my mind way too broad and not enough detail to really understand your topics. I read through the section for this exam when I started and never opened it again instead I studied the resources listed as it was just too broad!
Amber Books - Will be getting this for later tests
How to start/Study:
If you want to really delve into this as a career and spend time to learn everything
- Read AHPP for this section of the test per the guides listed above
- Now that you understand where the study guide pulled the info you should read it and then start contracts
- Use Shiff Harden Lectures to understand Contract Law - got to know what terms are and how to read a contract first
- Once your done go through the contracts yourself and create your short hand as mentioned way up above here.
- Now you have your study materials for everything but Finances
- Get Hyperfine Architecture (make sure to get the workbook) - Go through the problems and use them to understand how to do and use your financial ratios and other formulas
- Use Designer Hacks and the CDS test before you start studying studying your material. This will help let you know immediately what is unknown to you and what areas you need to really study since you've exposed yourself the information you should have learned some things.
- Now study your Study Guide, Contract Short Hand, and Finance Problems (Redo these and find extras)
- When you feel ready go take your test.
If you want to study to just pass:
- Read your study guide/ study it
- (Optional) Listen to Schiff Harden Lectures - Not a Requirement but helps!
- Go through the contracts yourself and create your short hand as mentioned way up above here.
- Now you have your study materials for everything but Finances
- Get Hyperfine Architecture (make sure to get the workbook) - Go through the problems and use them to understand how to do and use your financial ratios and other formulas
- Use Designer Hacks and the ARE 4.0 Kaplan CDS Practice Test before you start studying your material. This will help let you know immediately what is unknown to you and what areas you need to really study since you've exposed yourself the information you should have learned some things.
- Now study your Study Guide, Contract Short Hand, and Finance Problems based off your results (Redo these and find extras finance problems)
- When you feel ready go take your test
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Emily Khalid
This is it do not worry about the vinettes i did not find it helpful for this section
https://gofile.io/d/UATqNz
Let me know if the link does not work or if you have any issues with this site. -
I really appreciate the comprehensive study guide. I'm a bit confused why people think the Tatyana Aksamentova notes/ study guide is "invaluable" and the Ballast book is "worthless". The Tatyana Aksamentova document is the Ballast book. Her notes match up sub chapter to sub chapter with the Ballast PCM section.
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Hi Christopher,
I know it's been some time since you posted this - but I've been continuously referencing your post while studying for PcM these last couple months. So THANK YOU!
I was not able to track down the CDS practice exam from Kaplan for the 4.0 test you mentioned. Would you mind linking to it/the answers?
Thanks so much again for the valuable insight!
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Hey Christopher,
Congrats on passing PcM first try!
Since ARE candidates come from such varying educational and professional backgrounds, it's tough to guarantee that candidates will pass if they use our content only. Some people study for one exam for a few months and others take and pass three exams in three weeks.
While we do recommend that you use at least an ARE 5.0 Premium subscription (videos and practice exams) you can read dozens of customer reviews on our TrustPilot page. Here, many of our customers explain how they either solely used us to prepare or how and when they needed to dig deeper in other resources based on their weak points and study habits.
NCARB has also approved all six divisions of our content to appropriately cover the objectives of each exam. As a side note: The same as candidates taking the exams, we also are not privy to the actual questions or content of each exam and have built our content around the NCARB objectives, we do not cover actual questions from the ARE.
Hope this addresses your impression of Black Spectacles, and best of luck on your other divisions!
- Lara
Black Spectacles
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