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

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Type

AnyTechnicalCaseFitMarket viewBrainteaser

1. 040What metrics would you look at when valuing a retail company?Sector knowledgeIntermediatetechnicalSilver LakeTechnology, Media and Telecom · San Francisco · 2022

   Say this

   Same-store sales decomposed into traffic and ticket, gross margin, sales per square foot, inventory turns, and the four-wall economics of a store. Then lease liabilities, because that is where retail leverage hides.

   Then walk it

   1. Comparable store sales is the quality signal, because total revenue growth can be manufactured by opening stores. Break it into transactions and average ticket, and ticket into units and price.
   2. Gross margin trend against comps tells you whether sales are being bought with discounting.
   3. Sales per square foot and four-wall EBITDA, meaning store-level profit before corporate overhead. That determines whether new stores create value and what the payback period on a new store is.
   4. Inventory turns and the inventory-to-sales relationship. Inventory building faster than sales is the earliest reliable warning of markdowns to come.
   5. Online mix and its profitability, including returns and delivery cost, because e-commerce margin is often far worse than the store channel once fulfilment is loaded.
   6. For a sponsor specifically: the lease portfolio. Rent is a fixed obligation and the lease liability behaves like debt, so a retailer with a long lease estate is far more levered than its net debt suggests. And the real estate itself may be worth more than the operating business, which changes the whole thesis.

   Where candidates lose it

   Giving generic metrics with no retail specificity. Four-wall economics, inventory turns and the lease liability are the three that mark out someone who has looked at a retail deal.

   Expect next

   • How do you treat lease liabilities in leverage?
   • What is four-wall EBITDA?
   • Would you rather own the real estate or the operating company?

   Reported by candidates at Silver Lake (Technology, Media and Telecom, San Francisco, 2022). Source: Wall Street Oasis.

2. 052Walk me through getting to the exit value of a property from gross potential rent, using a cap rate.Sector knowledgeIntermediatetechnicalInvescoReal Estate · New York · 2025

   Say this

   Start at gross potential rent, subtract vacancy and credit loss to get effective gross income, add other income, subtract operating expenses to get NOI, then divide NOI by the exit cap rate.

   Then walk it

   1. Gross potential rent is what the property would earn fully leased at market rent, so it is a theoretical maximum.
   2. Less vacancy and collection loss, typically 5 to 10 percent depending on the market and asset, gives effective gross income.
   3. Plus other income: parking, storage, laundry, signage, expense recoveries from tenants.
   4. Less operating expenses: property taxes, insurance, utilities, repairs, management fee, and a reserve for replacements. Critically, this excludes debt service and capital expenditure, because NOI is an unlevered, pre-capital measure.
   5. That gives NOI. Divide by the exit cap rate and you have gross exit value. So NOI of $1 million at a 6 percent cap is $16.7 million.
   6. Then subtract selling costs, usually 1 to 3 percent, and repay the outstanding loan balance to get equity proceeds. Those proceeds plus the interim cash flows give you the equity IRR.

   Where candidates lose it

   Including debt service or CapEx in NOI. NOI is deliberately unlevered and pre-capital so that properties with different financing are comparable. Including either makes the cap rate meaningless.

   Expect next

   • What cap rate would you use at exit versus entry?
   • Where do leasing commissions and tenant improvements go?
   • How does a 100 basis point cap rate move change your value?

   Reported by candidates at Invesco (Real Estate, New York, 2025). 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.