First, you have done an excellent job so far. I know you want more—I just want to make sure you're giving yourself credit for everything you've done so far.
Second, I know that reps from certain schools are still talking about wanting certain "percentiles" (which change every year, as opposed to certain scores, which do not). They...let's say they have not kept up with the changing data. They are not populating their classes only with people who score Q49+—they wouldn't be able to find enough candidates who have both that kind of Q score and the V and IR scores that they want, along with the kind of business experience / background that they need. I have heard this same story from other students, who are then later told that the ~Q46 they achieved is okay after all. To be fair: Perhaps they're saying this because they want you to shoot higher in case you fall a little short. I can understand that. Though I do think it would be better for everyone to just say, "This is our minimum score requirement"—so that students knows where they stand.
As such, I would make your first goal to hit Q46. See what it takes to get yourself there and then decide: You might want to take the GMAT, hit that level, then tell the schools where you're at and see what they say. I can't guarantee anything, of course...but as I said, I've heard from multiple students applying to one of the schools you mentioned who've been okay at this level. (And, of course, it isn't the GMAT score that gets them in. Their work experience is stellar, etc. The GMAT score just shows that they are capable of handling the quant work at the program.)
Next, the Advanced Quant guide is designed for people who are at about the 47 level right now and want to jump up to 50/51. So you may want this guide eventually, but you may not be quite ready for it right now. (FYI: That guide also assumes that you have mastered everything in the 5 "regular" quant strategy guides, including the material in the Extra chapters.)
I took a quick look at your last practice test in our system (you did just the Q section and scored 44). You do have some timing issues that I want you to examine—you're exhibiting a pattern of what we call up-and-down timing. Look at the questions on which you spent >3 min and tell me what you notice. (In particular, how much time did you spend in total on these questions and how many did you get right vs. wrong?)
Next, you were able to maintain a score of about 45-46 for the first half of the section...but you then had a couple of long strings of incorrect answers, starting with #21. At the start, your score was so high that you probably should have missed a few, but you ended up missing 9 out of 10—that really pulled your score down. You then got a bunch right and were able to lift back up a decent amount, but you didn't have enough questions left to lift back to your starting point. (You also went into the whole sequence about 4 minutes behind. Were you aware of that? Was that adding to the pressure? You came out of that sequence only 1 minute behind.)
Go look at those problems. At the start, you had some very tough questions so you probably should have missed those. After that, though, your score started to drop and you started to get some easier ones...but you were still missing them. If you really didn't know how to do them, then there are some holes in your foundation at that sub-700 level, so go work on those things. If, on the other hand, you could do them in normal time / not feeling rushed, or you made careless mistakes due to rushing or mental fatigue, etc, then there are things to work on there in terms of timing / decision-making and consistent process (to minimize careless mistakes).
So I would say that you probably do have some timing and decision-making issues that you could address—and the good news is that you may already be capable of hitting a 45-46 type score on the real thing if you can fix those problems alone.
First read this (short but will lay the groundwork):
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... lly-tests/Then take a look at this (you can read the article or watch the webinar linked at the beginning):
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... -the-gmat/Use the above in conjunction with the below article to review Official Guide or other problems and learn the takeaways that you need in order to (a) find better / faster ways to do the problems that you do want to do and (b) know when to cut a problem off, guess, and move on.
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... -the-gmat/Also, this is the full process for thoroughly analyzing your practice CATs; above, I mentioned only a few of the things you could analyze:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/blog ... ts-part-1/There's also private tutoring, of course, if you find that you've hit a wall and don't know how to get yourself past it. Tutoring is very expensive, though, so you'll have to decide whether you want to go there. You've done a great job via self-study so far, and you may be fine continuing to push yourself further.
If you decide that you want to push further than 46 on the quant, then we can talk about various options from there. Note: We are about to launch an Advanced GMAT course for people who have already managed to hit certain subscores on the Q and V sections but want to push further. The requirements are a Q44 minimum and a V35 minimum (and a 650 minimum overall—you have to hit all 3 requirements). The first course starts on March 25th and the class runs 5 weeks. (There will be another one starting mid-Apr.)
Okay, go do that analysis and come back to tell me what you discovered!
