RPA/FMA Live Course List

This is an elective course for both the RPA and FMA.

Today's property managers work hand-in-hand with asset managers and often serve as asset managers themselves. Expert education gives professionals the capability to build value in real estate assets, providing confidence to investors, owners and building tenants. Make sense of your assets and master the ability to outperform competitors.

Key topic areas include: asset planning, forms of real estate ownership, financial and environmental due diligence, financial audits, troubled assets, maximum market value, investment portfolio diversification, investment analysis software and more.

This is a required course for the RPA.

Budgeting and Accounting features applications and problems you can use to create building and facilities' budgets. In this course, you will have the opportunity to apply concepts within the real property and facilities context. You will follow the accounting process and creation of a budget from start to finish, learning valuable skills such as how to interpret financial statements, annual reports and statements of cash flows. You will also learn practical skills such as how to compile lease abstracts and prepare rent rolls. The course includes valuable exercises pertaining to computing productivity ratios, depreciation, ending cash balances, preparing income and expense budgets, explaining budget variances and more.

Key topic areas: Record-keeping requirements, revenue and expenditure cycles, cash basis income statement, financial statements, annual reports, lease abstracts, income and expense budgeting, working with capital and more.

This is a required course for both the RPA and FMA. Design Ops I and II can be taken in any order. Design I does not need to be taken first.

Design Ops I provides information property and facility managers need to manage the ongoing operation and maintenance of building systems. Students will leave how to maximize building efficiency and cost-effectiveness.

Key topic areas include: building design and construction, life-cycle costing, construction materials, structural systems, building envelopes, roofing, interior walls, ceilings, flooring, HVAC and plumbing systems, building system controls and automation and more.

This is a required course for both the RPA and FMA. Design Ops I and II can be taken in any order. Design I does not need to be taken first.

Design Ops II provides information property and facility managers need to increase occupant safety and comfort while facilitating building efficiency to meet the business goals of an organization. This course will cover building systems management, analytics and optimization, best practices in building operations and maintenance and high performance security and life safety systems design.

Key topic areas include: energy management, security systems, business continuity, fire protection and life safety systems, electrical systems, clean power, green power, UPS systems and submetering, lighting, integrated pest management, solid waste management, vertical transportation systems, cleaning and maintenance of windows, metals, and other surfaces, contract cleaning, landscaping, parking and more.

This is a required course for both the RPA and FMA.

Ensuring workplace and employee health and safety are issues at the center stage of today's property industry. As a property professional, this course will help you develop and manage proactive environmental/occupational health and safety programs, comply with regulatory standards and guidelines and assess when to obtain technical assistance.

Key topic areas: Local, state, and federal regulations, environmental site assessments, hazard communication, emergency response, asbestos and lead management, ergonomics, indoor air quality, hazardous waste, storage tanks, audits, record keeping, and other regulatory issues, ADA, EPA, OSHA and more.

This is a required course for both the RPA and FMA. Ethics is Good Business is a one-day course.

This course helps you understand the impact that ethical behavior can have on your professional performance and your property’s bottom line. By working through difficult ethical dilemmas, you’ll develop the confidence to follow through, even when facing adversity.

Key topic areas include: tenant relations, triple bottom line, confidentiality, record keeping, trade secrets, proper use of funds, conflicts of interest, corporate social responsibility, environmental stewardship and more.

This is a required course for the RPA. 

In today's complex business environment, it is increasingly important for property managers to know how to address legal and risk management issues. This course will provide you with a foundation in the basic principles of law and risk management, helping you deal with everyday legal and risk issues surrounding your business. In addition to addressing leasing and conveyance, the course covers important issues on torts, contracts, employer and employee relations, property rights and environmental law.

Key topic areas include: conveying and financing real estate, contracts, property interests, premises liability, environmental law and concerns, employment relationships and agency, introduction to risk management, insurance company operations, principles of insurance and insurable risk, general liability insurance and employee benefit plans, loss exposures and more.

This is an elective course for the RPA.

Leasing and Marketing for Property Managers is a resource and how-to guide for property managers who have been assigned the additional responsibility of leasing. The course covers everything from working with owners and prospective tenants, to creating marketing and leasing plans, to writing the actual lease. You will be provided with websites, techniques, and valuable resources to smooth your transition from property manager to leasing agent.

As a property manager/leasing agent, you must be effective in placing customer needs ahead of other considerations. You must be able to respond rapidly to change, anticipate trends, and present your building more persuasively than the competition can. Furthermore, you must know that a signed lease at the end of the sales process is the true beginning of marketing efforts, because it is cheaper to keep a tenant than to have to spend money finding a new one.

This is a required course for both the RPA and FMA.

Through this course, you will learn to take charge of real estate investments in order to maximize the value of a property. You will develop knowledge about basic financial concepts as they relate to real estate, including valuation, analysis, taxation, depreciation and life-cycle costing. You will also learn to evaluate real estate investments and to develop budgets that estimate net operating income. You will study the income capitalization approach and cover property taxation costs and strategies to offset these costs. You will also gain the skills to conduct discounted cash flow analyses and calculate net present value and internal rate of return. This course features exercises that require the basic use of the HP 10bII financial calculator.

Key topic areas include: asset valuation and enhancement, taxes, capitalization, site and building analysis, the appraisal process, discounted cash flow measurement,  ownership vehicles, the basics of lending, current lending practice and more.