Website:
zeneb5.com
Job details:
Headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona, Zenn Investing is led by a team of real estate professionals with regional market experience. The firm manages the full development lifecycle, from land acquisition and entitlements through vertical construction, stabilization, and long-term asset management.
Zenn Investing's active development pipeline comprises six communities across the Phoenix MSA, totaling more than 706 multifamily units and over $229M in total development budget, along with a hospitality project in Tucson.
We are seeking a detail-oriented Staff Accountant to support the Controller in the day-to-day accounting operations of a growing real estate private equity firm focused on ground-up development, build-to-rent communities, and value-add multifamily assets. This role owns the full accounts payable cycle across multiple entities and projects, tracks contractor billings against long-term construction commitments, handles development management fee and intercompany billing, and carries meaningful general accounting responsibility, including month-end close support, account reconciliations, and job cost tracking.
The ideal candidate is highly organized, comfortable working across many entities and bank accounts, and eager to learn real estate development and fund accounting. This is a hands-on role with clear growth potential under an experienced Controller.
Key Responsibilities
Accounts Payable
- Own the end-to-end AP cycle across all corporate, fund, and project entities, from invoice intake through payment and filing.
- Process vendor invoices, subcontractor billings, and employee expense reports in bill.com/Intuit Enterprise, ensuring accurate entity, project, and job cost coding.
- Route invoices for approval per the firm’s approval matrix and follow up to keep payables moving on schedule.
- Prepare weekly payment runs (ACH, check, wire) and reconcile bill.com activity to Intuit Enterprise Suite.
- Maintain vendor master data, W-9s, insurance certificates, and lien waivers; prepare annual 1099 filings.
- Support construction draw packages by assembling invoice backup, cost-to-date detail, and supporting documentation for lenders.
- Manage the AP aging, resolve vendor inquiries, and maintain accurate accrual detail at period end.
- Contract & Commitment Accounting
- Maintain a commitment ledger in Intuit Enterprise for every general contractor and subcontractor agreement, tracking original contract value, approved change orders, revised contract value, billed to date, retainage held, and remaining commitment by project.
- Review monthly pay applications (AIA G702/G703 or equivalent) from the general contractor against the schedule of values, verifying percent complete billed, stored materials, and prior billings before payment is released.
- Reconcile cumulative billings to the revised contract value and flag any pay application that would exceed the contracted commitment, bill against unexecuted change orders, or run ahead of work in place.
- Track change orders from request through full execution, ensuring the commitment ledger and project budget are updated and that nothing is paid against an unapproved change.
- Calculate and record retainage withheld on each pay application, maintain the retainage payable schedule by contract, and process retainage releases with the required final lien waivers and closeout documentation.
- Collect and verify conditional and unconditional lien waivers from the general contractor and lower-tier subcontractors for each payment cycle.
- Reconcile the commitment ledger to job cost detail and the general ledger monthly, and provide committed vs. incurred vs. remaining-budget reporting to the Controller and development team.
- Maintain organized contract files, including executed agreements, exhibits, change orders, pay applications, waivers, and insurance certificates.
General Accounting & Month-End Close
- Prepare and post recurring and standard journal entries, including accruals, prepaid amortization, depreciation, and intercompany allocations.
- Perform monthly bank, credit card, and balance sheet account reconciliations across multiple entities.
- Maintain schedules for prepaid expenses, fixed assets, accrued liabilities, and intercompany balances.
- Assist the Controller in closing the books on a defined monthly calendar and in preparing financial statement packages.
- Enter and reconcile job cost detail; support tracking of hard vs. soft costs, change orders, and budget variances.
- Assist with capitalization of development costs in accordance with GAAP, under Controller review.
Development Management Fee & Intercompany Billing
- Prepare and issue monthly development management fee invoices from the management entity to each development entity in accordance with the terms of the applicable development management agreements.
- Calculate fees per each agreement — percentage of total project costs, fixed monthly amount, or milestone-based — and maintain supporting schedules of fees earned, billed, and remaining under each contract.
- Bill reimbursable and allocated costs to project entities, including shared overhead, payroll allocations, and third-party costs paid on a project’s behalf.
- Record both sides of every intercompany billing, ensuring receivable and payable balances agree across entities and eliminate cleanly in consolidation.
- Reconcile intercompany accounts monthly and track settlement of balances and cash transfers between entities.
- Ensure management fees are properly capitalized or expensed at the project entity level in accordance with GAAP, under Controller review.
Treasury, Reporting & Support
- Monitor daily cash positions across entities and accounts and record cash activity timely.
- Support other AR functions, including tenant and partner billings, deposits, and collections follow-up as needed.
- Assist with payroll entries and related reconciliations.
- Pull supporting documentation and schedules for annual audits, tax return preparation, and lender or investor requests.
- Help maintain organized digital accounting files and documentation standards across entities and projects.
Systems, Processes & Controls
- Work primarily in bill.com and Intuit Enterprise Suite; help maintain clean chart of accounts, entity, class, and project structures.
- Follow and help improve internal controls, approval workflows, and closing procedures.
- Identify opportunities to automate or streamline recurring accounting tasks.
Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, or a related field. CPA/CA or working towards this qualification required.
- 2–4 years of accounting experience, including hands-on accounts payable ownership.
- Working knowledge of US GAAP and full-cycle month-end close procedures.
- Experience with bill.com and Intuit Enterprise Suite strongly preferred; QuickBooks Online experience considered in lieu of Intuit Enterprise Suite.
- Construction or real estate development accounting experience strongly preferred, including exposure to long-term contracts, AIA pay applications and schedules of values, change orders, retainage, and lien waivers.
- Comfort tracking committed costs against contract values and budgets across multiple concurrent projects.
- Multi-entity accounting experience is a significant plus, particularly preparing intercompany billings and reconciling intercompany balances; exposure to construction draws or fund structures preferred but not required.
- Strong Excel skills (pivot tables, lookups, large data sets).
- Exceptional attention to detail, strong organizational skills, and the ability to manage high invoice volume across many entities.
- Clear communicator who works well with vendors, project managers, and executive leadership.
- Self-starter comfortable in a fast-paced, growing environment.
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