New owner of phone and I need to get admin access!
Is that an Exchange email? Then YES, removing it will trigger a Factory Reset. This is standard operating procedure, for security purposes (of the company).

As dotVezz said, you should back-up all your data (pictures, documents, downloaded files, etc). To back-up your apps and its data, you can use Titanium Backup; needs ROOT. Just to be on the safe side, also copy the Titanium folder (contains apps and data) to your PC. After doing a Factory Reset, just restore the files with Titanium Backup (which you'd need to download from Google Play after the Factory Reset).