What is a Mentor?

Mentors are volunteers that are professionals from the real estate industry who are giving of their time and talents to assist the student team members in preparing their submittals for the final round of judging. One of the main goals of the Real Estate Challenge is to give the participants more of a real world experience in how developing real estate works. The Mentor program is really where the rubber meets the road. By giving the Challenge participants the opportunity to rub shoulder with real professionals the process of competing provides to them a practical education and enriching experience in the field of real estate development.

Who Gets Mentors?

The six finalist teams are given the option to have mentors. The Challenge will assign up to 2 mentors per finalist team to work with them in tuning up their submittals and assist in getting ready for the oral presentation at the finals.

What do the Mentors do?

Mentors are a resource to the finalist team in assisting their preparation of their final written submittal and to help them prepare for the oral presentation to the judges. Basically the mentors will review the proposal of the team and then meet with them to give ideas and suggestions on how to fine tune the written submittal. They will also give suggestions on how to make an oral presentation to the judges. Once the team has their final written submittal ready the Mentors will meet again with the team for a final critique and to observe a rehearsal of their oral presentation.


By using real world professionals as Mentors the Real Estate Challenge hopes to provide a much richer experience to the students and participants of the challenge. This feature will allow the submittals to be compared with the real world of real estate development and provide practical learning to the participants. It will also be a hands on educational experience to those continuing on and pursuing a career in this field.