best way to learn excel financial modeling?

CFA General
#1

I am totally new to MS Excel and want to learn excel to the point where I have a good handle on complex financial modeling techniques. I was wondering what could be the best way to take a start and move up to that level? are self study courses available on internet of any good help?

how long could it take to master excel based financial modeling?

any other input is more than welcome

#2

YouTube.

#3

Are you looking for courses that are more about financial modeling or more about excel? I use excel for financial modeling everyday and I still wish that my excel skills were a lot more sharp so I got 2 books on finance in excel and they help a lot, but they are more geared towards VBA and Macros.

#4

You are new to excel??? Huuuuh

#5

for the time being, I want to learn and then improve my financial modeling skills… how could I do that? any suggestions?

#6

I don’t think anybody has excel in their genes :slight_smile:

#7

If you’re new to excel, it would make sense to get your basic excel skills up to speed first. I recommend the “Excel Is Fun” youtube channel. The guy is a bit goofy, but the series is fantastic (I recommend it to all my students). Once you’ve done that, try Benninga’s Financial Modeling text.

#8

^ Excel is fun is how I learned how to excel! I downloaded his workbooks and watched the beginner and intermediate courses and that got me up to speed real quick. The guy is enthusiastic, which I enjoyed.

After that, I used Macabacus.

#9

thank you so much for your input. definitely going to do that

#10

how long could those youtube tutorials take if I put about 5 hours daily?

#11

^ The beginning and intermediate courses are structured like if you were to take a semester long class. I can’t remember exactly but I did about 4-5 hours a day and finished in a month, maybe 6 weeks. You may fast foward some sections that you know but I was a noob so I sat through it all.

#12

thank you very much :slight_smile:

#13

Don’t bother watching tutorials about doing random excel things unless you need them right now. Just pick something that you already do at your work and try to automote it in excel, google for answers when you get stuck