Private Equity interview preparation

Questions

100

Traced to a firm

83

Firms

40

Updated

September 2026

Asked at

All firmsAdvent International6Apollo Global Management6Audax Group6Carlyle Group6EQT6Silver Lake6Vista Equity Partners6WPWarburg Pincus6HIH.I.G. Capital5Oaktree Capital Management5Platinum Equity5TPTPG5General Atlantic4AMAres Management3Blackstone3Clayton Dubilier and Rice3GSGuggenheim Securities3Insight Partners3Invesco3Lazard3Neuberger Berman3NUNuveen3TSTruist Securities3Bain Capital2HWHarris Williams2Kohlberg Kravis Roberts2Millennium Management2Moody's2Rothschild & Co2WBWilliam Blair2Bessemer Venture Partners1Citi1Evercore1FTFranklin Templeton1Houlihan Lokey1HPS Investment Partners1KKR1Mizuho1MSMorgan Stanley1Sycamore Partners1

Topic

All topicsLBO mechanics7Value creation5Returns2Fund economics9Investment judgement18Valuation6Firm knowledge2Credit and financing9Operations4Due diligence8Career and fit11Sector knowledge4Accounting2Deal structuring7Industry knowledge3Brainteasers3

Level

AnyCoreIntermediateHard

Type

AnyTechnicalCaseFitMarket viewBrainteaser

1. 020How would you evaluate a deal? Walk me through your process.Investment judgementIntermediatetechnicalApollo Global ManagementReal Estate · New York · 2026TPTPGInvestment Banking · San Francisco · 2019

   Say this

   Market, then company, then plan, then price, then structure, then exit. Decide whether it is a business you want to own before you decide what it is worth.

   Then walk it

   1. Market: is it growing, is it fragmented, what drives demand, and is the structure stable? A good company in a deteriorating market is a hard hold.
   2. Company: market position, customer concentration, revenue quality and recurrence, margin durability, and the real earnings power after quality-of-earnings adjustments.
   3. The plan: what do we do that the current owner is not doing? If there is no specific answer, you are paying full price for someone else's work.
   4. Price and returns: what multiple, what leverage, what IRR under base and downside cases. Crucially, what must be true for the base case to hold.
   5. Structure and risk: covenant headroom in a downside, customer or supplier concentration, key-person risk, litigation, regulatory exposure.
   6. Exit: who buys it and at what multiple, and does the deal still work if the exit multiple is a turn below entry. That last sensitivity is the one investment committees always run.

   Where candidates lose it

   Leading with the model. Sponsors want to hear judgement about the business first and arithmetic second. And every answer should include what must be true, because that framing is how investment committees actually discuss deals.

   Expect next

   • What must be true for this to work?
   • What would make you walk away?
   • What if you exit a turn lower than entry?

   Reported by candidates at Apollo Global Management (Real Estate, New York, 2026); TPG (Investment Banking, San Francisco, 2019). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

2. 060How do you approach evaluating a deal in an industry you know nothing about?Investment judgementIntermediatetechnicalApollo Global ManagementReal Estate · New York · 2026GSGuggenheim SecuritiesHealthcare · London · 2026

   Say this

   Start from the economics rather than the industry jargon. Who pays, for what, how often, and why them rather than a competitor. Those four questions work in any sector and get you to the investment question quickly.

   Then walk it

   1. Map the value chain first: who makes it, who distributes it, who buys it, and where the profit pool sits. Profit pools are rarely where the revenue is.
   2. Then the customer: who writes the cheque, how much, how often, and how painful is it to switch. That gives you revenue durability without needing sector expertise.
   3. Then the competitive structure: how many players, is share stable or moving, and what determines who wins. Stable share usually means a real barrier; churning share usually means price competition.
   4. Then read the incumbents' filings and the trade press, and talk to people. Two hours with a former executive in the sector is worth a week of desk research.
   5. Then apply the generic tests that transfer: returns on capital versus cost of capital, cash conversion, cyclicality, capital intensity, and regulatory exposure.
   6. And be explicit about what you do not know. The right output early is a list of the three things that would determine whether this is investable, which is exactly what commercial diligence is then scoped to answer.

   Where candidates lose it

   Pretending to sector knowledge you lack. Generalist funds ask this to see whether you have a transferable framework and the humility to name your unknowns. Bluffing gets exposed in the follow-up.

   Expect next

   • What would be the three things you would need to find out?
   • Who would you call?
   • How long before you could form a view?

   Reported by candidates at Apollo Global Management (Real Estate, New York, 2026); Guggenheim Securities (Healthcare, London, 2026). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

Firm tags come from public, anonymous candidate reports on Wall Street Oasis: strong signal, not sworn testimony. Firms are named as the places a question was reported, not as partners of Fin Maverick. Answers are written for this page to show how to think out loud; they are not scripts to recite.