Latest / Earn Your Leisure / Africa’s Real Estate Boom Is Just Getting Started | How to Invest Safely-MP3

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Africa’s Real Estate Boom Is Just Getting Started | How to Invest Safely-MP3 · Earn Your Leisure

0:00
Speaker 1: When I did the podcast with you all, I was
0:02
Speaker 1: telling you probably the most impactful interview I've done in
0:07
Speaker 1: my career. He wrote out as real. He wrote, he
0:11
Speaker 1: was shot at try to talk about the tax letters
0:14
Speaker 1: talk about finance.
0:15
Speaker 2: But we talk in a language that is common to
0:18
Speaker 2: the people, that's from the communities that we grew up in.
0:20
Speaker 1: You all are the bright spot, thank Lewership for Black Americans.
0:26
Speaker 1: This is the knowledge that actually matters. I flagg both
0:30
Speaker 1: of you for this, Saint.
0:32
Speaker 3: Isn't it a country issue.
0:34
Speaker 2: It's not an American issue, It's a world issue.
0:36
Speaker 1: You came to earn our leisure. So how'd you how'd
0:45
Speaker 1: you like get started specifically in Africa? Like doing this
0:51
Speaker 1: like well in relationship.
0:53
Speaker 3: When I was doing a hospitality and running a hotel
0:56
Speaker 3: in South so France, I told myself, either I go
1:00
Speaker 3: to Canada to work at the Softel at Montreal, or
1:04
Speaker 3: they offered me to come to Dakar to work at
1:06
Speaker 3: the now Hotel. Hotel here in that car and I
1:10
Speaker 3: wanted to feel like home. I wanted to feel like
1:13
Speaker 3: I had an impact because when you go work in
1:15
Speaker 3: big cities, you just add some small percentage over small
1:18
Speaker 3: percentage and you're just a number. They replace you. When
1:21
Speaker 3: you come here, you'll become a player quickly. So it's
1:24
Speaker 3: a bigger playground, more interesting, and then you can actually
1:28
Speaker 3: become a Carnegie of your area. It can become a
1:31
Speaker 3: big investor, whereas it's not impossible in big countries. But
1:35
Speaker 3: the struggle you have to go through, the difficulties, whatever
1:38
Speaker 3: you go through, is too much head compared to the reward.
1:42
Speaker 3: And here you feel home and where are you originally from?
1:46
Speaker 1: Have you.
1:48
Speaker 3: New York?
1:53
Speaker 1: It's beautiful, beautiful culture. You definitely see there's a lot
1:56
Speaker 1: that still has to be done. But that's an opportunity.
1:58
Speaker 3: Yeah, a lot of opportunity and the purchasing power. When
2:02
Speaker 3: you're an American and you can put one hundred grounds
2:06
Speaker 3: in an apartment and looking at ROI around ten percent,
2:13
Speaker 3: it's not crazy, it's interesting.
2:16
Speaker 1: So like one hundred thousand and get you an apartment.
2:18
Speaker 3: Here, Yeah, it can get you one bedroom apartment. And
2:23
Speaker 3: now it's more reading around one hundred and ten hundred
2:26
Speaker 3: and twenty. It keeps growing. The two I have one
2:29
Speaker 3: bedroom apartment. I bought them eighty thousand each five years ago.
2:35
Speaker 3: Now they go around eighty one hundred and one hundred
2:38
Speaker 3: and ten something. But the return is very high because
2:42
Speaker 3: it's twenty three percent. How much is the rent it's
2:46
Speaker 3: in the US two thousand approximate two thousand dollars, so
2:50
Speaker 3: twenty four years so around in this area. In this
2:55
Speaker 3: area is going to be more like one point five.
2:59
Speaker 1: Point six buy cash or they get mortgages.
3:04
Speaker 3: In Africa, they like cash. They don't trust banks that
3:09
Speaker 3: much and they don't want to be in the system
3:12
Speaker 3: to show their earnings, to show trusibility so that they
3:16
Speaker 3: can leverage funds and bank system here is very tough.
3:22
Speaker 3: Like in US, mortgage is like nothing. You work a
3:24
Speaker 3: little and then you get it. Here you have to
3:27
Speaker 3: kill somebody to get to get the mortgage. Yeah, it's
3:31
Speaker 3: very tough.
3:31
Speaker 1: Interest rate.
3:32
Speaker 3: Let's say it's eight seven eight. But for African market,
3:38
Speaker 3: when you get the twenty four percent err, you borrow
3:42
Speaker 3: money at eight makes sense, It makes a lot of sense.
3:47
Speaker 3: It makes sense. But we need to be careful and
3:50
Speaker 3: resist the urge to be in the formal kind of
3:53
Speaker 3: mentality and be rushing to buy land, to buy apartment
3:59
Speaker 3: without thinking heads. That's the issue. Some people like they
4:03
Speaker 3: see the excitement and instead of taking the time they
4:06
Speaker 3: go into formal modes and then you hear stories, Oh,
4:09
Speaker 3: he came, he brought fifty k down payment, and now
4:12
Speaker 3: he's never heard about his fifty k more. Again, you
4:15
Speaker 3: have to be careful.
4:16
Speaker 1: Let's talk about that, because that's something that a lot
4:18
Speaker 1: of people are kind of nervous of, Like, how do
4:20
Speaker 1: you avoid that?
4:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, you have to go through the proper channels. It
4:25
Speaker 3: cannot be you know a guy who knows a guy
4:27
Speaker 3: and it's going to help you out. That's over. Forget
4:31
Speaker 3: about this anybody telling you that kind of Let's say
4:35
Speaker 3: I know a guy who knows a guy. Half the time,
4:38
Speaker 3: it's bullshit. Yeah, you don't need to know a guy.
4:42
Speaker 3: If you have money, you go through the official shadows,
4:46
Speaker 3: everything's going to be fine with you.
4:47
Speaker 1: Official chance would be like a real estate agent, Yeah.
4:49
Speaker 3: Real estate agent, an ary agent. For example, we sold
4:53
Speaker 3: the spent house here to an American guy in Texas,
4:57
Speaker 3: top one, seven hundred k, and he insisted to go
5:02
Speaker 3: through the notary. We went through the process, We put
5:05
Speaker 3: the money in a scrawl account and no problem, you know,
5:09
Speaker 3: and he was insisting in procedures, which is good.
5:12
Speaker 1: How big? How big is that?
5:14
Speaker 3: It was about two hundred and fifty squarameter with a
5:18
Speaker 3: big balcony and you have a beautiful c view from
5:22
Speaker 3: there to the ocean. Yeah, so that is this building
5:27
Speaker 3: sold out, fifty percent sold out. But the company I
5:32
Speaker 3: run because we are family investment funds and we don't
5:37
Speaker 3: depend on the cell to finish the property, so we
5:40
Speaker 3: don't rush out to sell because we want to finish
5:43
Speaker 3: it and to sell at the highest price expected. Whereas
5:46
Speaker 3: when you need money, you sell a quickly early stage
5:49
Speaker 3: of the project to make sure you have the cash,
5:51
Speaker 3: and then you build with the cash should being given
5:54
Speaker 3: by the clients.
5:55
Speaker 1: How's the like, I said, like the land lease? Is
5:59
Speaker 1: it a land lease?
6:00
Speaker 3: Good question. They have like three types of contracts. One
6:06
Speaker 3: that is called I don't know in English, deliberation is
6:09
Speaker 3: like the mayor of the city says, if you have
6:13
Speaker 3: a project, I will give you this land. Once you
6:15
Speaker 3: build the project, we can make the paperwork so that
6:18
Speaker 3: you can get the official documents. Then you have the lease.
6:23
Speaker 3: This is maybe fifty years, ninety nine years. Once you
6:25
Speaker 3: have a real project, then you can ask for a
6:27
Speaker 3: permanent title. And then you have the permanent title, which
6:31
Speaker 3: is something that you should always ask if you are foreignier,
6:35
Speaker 3: you come from outside Africa, ask for the official title.
6:39
Speaker 1: What's the what's the permanent title.
6:42
Speaker 3: It's like tito and it's like it's registered in the
6:46
Speaker 3: African constitution that it's yours. However, regardless of the president,
6:51
Speaker 3: regardless of the law, it's it's impossible for anybody to
6:55
Speaker 3: get that land from you, except if it gives you money.
7:00
Speaker 1: Is that only in this country or a lot of countries.
7:03
Speaker 3: On every notary whatever, there is a notary, he has
7:06
Speaker 3: the power because he's a subsidiary of the state's power,
7:11
Speaker 3: so he can say, okay, we signed together, it's yours
7:14
Speaker 3: no matter what. That's why I always go through even
7:17
Speaker 3: the money you give. Never give it hand to hand
7:21
Speaker 3: to anybody. Even if I sell you an apartment, don't
7:26
Speaker 3: give it to me. Find a notary because legally speaking,
7:30
Speaker 3: he has the required he's required to do due diligence.
7:35
Speaker 3: If it doesn't do it, it's on him.
7:38
Speaker 2: How competitive is this market, like this area, I think
7:42
Speaker 2: with all this coastal property and the appreciation for the bland,
7:47
Speaker 2: that alone has to be going up.
7:48
Speaker 3: You know, well, yeah, that car is like an almost island.
7:54
Speaker 3: Contrary to ivory cost Abijon which is a leand city
7:58
Speaker 3: a bijoint is growing like this exponentially without limits. That
8:03
Speaker 3: car is constraint to the top of the ocean, so
8:07
Speaker 3: that everything on these coasts is like Miami style. Let's
8:10
Speaker 3: see the coast. Then it's going high high, high, high,
8:13
Speaker 3: because it's impossible to go to like in Dubai, you
8:17
Speaker 3: cannot go in the water. So yeah, prices are going high. However,
8:22
Speaker 3: rented rent are being stable. That's why you have to
8:25
Speaker 3: be careful and start thinking ahead. And in a world
8:29
Speaker 3: where competition is high, lots of supply, lots of appartments,
8:34
Speaker 3: which are the ones that your tenants will pick the first,
8:38
Speaker 3: and this is where you have to invest.
8:39
Speaker 2: Most people more likely to go closer to the water
8:44
Speaker 2: or is it just something.
8:46
Speaker 3: Let's say they're going to look at schools and business districts.
8:52
Speaker 3: In Senegal, water is not something that deep because they
8:56
Speaker 3: are used to it. In Cabo Verde, water is not
8:58
Speaker 3: that deep. But for expats dot com water is a
9:03
Speaker 3: small factor, but they will not compromise distance work distance
9:08
Speaker 3: for water.
9:10
Speaker 2: So how far away from the business district.
9:12
Speaker 3: Here or something to know that car is spread split
9:16
Speaker 3: into two areas. Where you are in Newman as I.
9:21
Speaker 3: It's the middle that you're in the middle. You can
9:24
Speaker 3: go both ways. Here you're in Almadi area. The other
9:27
Speaker 3: side is business district area. So there is its own
9:31
Speaker 3: life here business district, et cetera, and there is its
9:34
Speaker 3: own life over there. It's very rare that you have
9:37
Speaker 3: somebody that lives here and go in the morning works
9:40
Speaker 3: over there. It's like one one hour and a half.
9:43
Speaker 3: They are going to do it. They're going to find
9:44
Speaker 3: a way to live here and work here, live there
9:46
Speaker 3: and work there unless you really have to.
9:49
Speaker 1: So, like for people, what's the biggest opportunity you think
9:52
Speaker 1: just in Africa period right now? For like the average
9:55
Speaker 1: the average person that wants to invest in Africa.
9:59
Speaker 3: Good question. Well, because of the operation risks, I cannot
10:08
Speaker 3: recommend let's say, agriculture, industry, manufacturing. Those are opportunities, but
10:16
Speaker 3: the operational risk are too high, so your money is
10:20
Speaker 3: too much at risks. So for me, I will focus
10:23
Speaker 3: on real estate because of let's say the stability and
10:28
Speaker 3: the predictability of it. You invest in farming and you
10:32
Speaker 3: don't live here, you have no idea whatever the guy
10:35
Speaker 3: is doing with your money, how serious he is. Is
10:37
Speaker 3: he selling at the right price. Is he producing at
10:40
Speaker 3: the right price, his employees, are they being legally contracted,
10:44
Speaker 3: et cetera, et cetera. So I would say for this
10:47
Speaker 3: confederation it's realistic. Then if you, let's say, come from
10:52
Speaker 3: the US and then you want to come and start
10:53
Speaker 3: to live here, then I would be open to any
10:56
Speaker 3: kind of business. You can go into hospitality. There is
11:00
Speaker 3: an American woman here study. She's not American, but she
11:03
Speaker 3: studied in the US along a lot of times. She
11:05
Speaker 3: has two hotels here working let's say services. Also, I
11:12
Speaker 3: had lunch today and yesterday at her restaurant in fun.
11:15
Speaker 3: She she's great, So I do. So hospitality is okay.
11:20
Speaker 3: Let's say financial service also is okay. Raising money. If
11:23
Speaker 3: you have the ability to raise US money and bring
11:26
Speaker 3: it to Africa, then you can make a lot of money.
11:29
Speaker 3: But again you have to find a way to make
11:31
Speaker 3: this money safe as well, so it's a headache. Also,
11:35
Speaker 3: people say oli in gas, but can the common person
11:39
Speaker 3: going in gas? So for me, when you have a
11:42
Speaker 3: fifty k to two hundred k realistic.
11:47
Speaker 2: So with entrepreneurs that are here sen Ago, obviously you study,
11:51
Speaker 2: you studied in Paris, came here. What does it look
11:55
Speaker 2: like for young entrepreneurs, other people like yourself that are
11:58
Speaker 2: talking to young people here to educate them on the
12:01
Speaker 2: process of.
12:01
Speaker 3: Real well I have, for instance, I will take my example.
12:08
Speaker 3: I have my platform with my podcasts. And the reason
12:11
Speaker 3: why I wanted to create that podcast is because one
12:15
Speaker 3: of the things in the black community is that there
12:18
Speaker 3: is a shortage of information. It's not that we don't
12:21
Speaker 3: have the resources, it's not that we don't have the
12:23
Speaker 3: opportunity or the skills. There is a shortage of accessing information. Succession,
12:29
Speaker 3: how to build your real estate LLC? What you should
12:32
Speaker 3: do when you get your first money, what do you do?
12:34
Speaker 3: Do you spend it on let's say expendable goods or
12:38
Speaker 3: do you invest in lands, in properties, etc. And accessing
12:42
Speaker 3: information in Africa is definitely key, definitely key. So more
12:47
Speaker 3: and more platform are doing this, let's say in Ivory
12:50
Speaker 3: Costs and Senegal also starting, some of them in Front
12:54
Speaker 3: or so are starting. But we still need more. We
12:57
Speaker 3: need more and more content creator to bring awareness, an awareness,
13:02
Speaker 3: bring level of expectations, brings a level of performance. When
13:06
Speaker 3: people know that you cannot easily get around their knowledge
13:10
Speaker 3: and let's say lights the sounds like another opportunity, absolutely
13:14
Speaker 3: information what you guys are doing. There is a void
13:18
Speaker 3: in what you guys are doing the bridge, but in
13:21
Speaker 3: Africa and America, let's say North America at large, has
13:25
Speaker 3: to still be fulfilled.
13:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you think this country will be like
13:34
Speaker 1: in ten years in the whole continent? Like in ten years?
13:36
Speaker 1: Do you how do you think this is gonna look
13:39
Speaker 1: for ten years?
13:40
Speaker 3: Let's say. The first thing that I want to mention
13:45
Speaker 3: is that at the African continent is a very young continent.
13:50
Speaker 3: So anything that has to do with the youth and
13:54
Speaker 3: the next generation, whether it's communication, whether it's technology, there
14:00
Speaker 3: it's education, whether it's housing, everything that has to do
14:03
Speaker 3: with the young people getting older. It's a big, let's
14:08
Speaker 3: say matter and topic. Also the growing of the middle class.
14:15
Speaker 3: We've known a gap between let's say the lesser revenues
14:20
Speaker 3: kind of population and the high high, high revenues. There
14:25
Speaker 3: is a big discrepancy between the two. And now, if
14:28
Speaker 3: we take the example of ivory costs, this gap is
14:31
Speaker 3: getting smaller and smaller. You have a middle class that
14:35
Speaker 3: is now starting to require services, requiring quality experience, restaurant
14:41
Speaker 3: close and they don't They no longer want to only
14:44
Speaker 3: look at the West to say, Okay, I have a
14:46
Speaker 3: little money, I would spend it in Paris, I would
14:48
Speaker 3: spend it in New York. What can I do if
14:50
Speaker 3: I'm a Senegalis and travel to Ivory Cost. I'm an
14:53
Speaker 3: Ivory Cost and travel to Senegal? What can I have
14:56
Speaker 3: as a product? So the middle class and every service
15:00
Speaker 3: can do for the middle class is very important. And
15:02
Speaker 3: also what I want to mention is that when you
15:05
Speaker 3: want to invest in Africa, most people, let's say, we'll
15:09
Speaker 3: focus on luxury goods, luxury service and only a high level,
15:14
Speaker 3: which is a niche, and it's getting crowded in that niche.
15:18
Speaker 3: What can we do for the middle class? What are
15:20
Speaker 3: the mass market product that I can create for that
15:24
Speaker 3: middle class?
15:25
Speaker 2: When you travel to different countries, you said Beneath Clotova
15:29
Speaker 2: Morocco as obviously real estate developer, but also as a consultant, Yeah,
15:36
Speaker 2: what are the things that you're advising on in based
15:39
Speaker 2: on the countries?
15:40
Speaker 3: Well, if we focus on real estate, the first thing
15:45
Speaker 3: I would tell my big investors or the state I
15:48
Speaker 3: advice is to run away from ego investment. Let's say
15:52
Speaker 3: real estate and hospitality are huge platform for ego assets.
15:58
Speaker 3: I'm the biggest player in I want the biggest building.
16:02
Speaker 3: I'm the biggest prayer in time. I want the biggest tower,
16:06
Speaker 3: even though it doesn't respond to a need. So the
16:09
Speaker 3: first thing I say is make sure you do your
16:11
Speaker 3: due diligence in the market you're going to tackle. I
16:14
Speaker 3: know it's a basic, it seems basic, but you have
16:17
Speaker 3: no idea how much ego investment is big here. So
16:22
Speaker 3: if you want to invest in let's say, residential real estates,
16:26
Speaker 3: where are the schools, Where are the work centers, where
16:30
Speaker 3: are the shops? What times does it take to go
16:33
Speaker 3: from this point to the other point? Is it safe?
16:35
Speaker 3: What are the rents? How much did you have to
16:37
Speaker 3: invest to produce that rent? And when you sort out
16:41
Speaker 3: all these questions already, that's a big, big, big investment.
16:44
Speaker 3: And also I advise them to focus on people. Again,
16:50
Speaker 3: it seems like a basic, but school and education and
16:56
Speaker 3: professionalism is a very paramount stake for Africa. If you
17:02
Speaker 3: want to build your factory, your hotel, your project an
17:07
Speaker 3: engineering company, construction company, you're going to spend most of
17:11
Speaker 3: your time creating skill, automatization, reporting process. You will spend
17:17
Speaker 3: all your time in the basics, not in defensive stuff
17:20
Speaker 3: of the branding, the naming, the innovation. That's an easy.
17:25
Speaker 3: So the last thing I would say is that in Africa,
17:30
Speaker 3: innovation and new ideas, let's say it's okay, But the
17:35
Speaker 3: most important is the quality of your execution. Can you execute?
17:39
Speaker 3: Can you go from point A to point B? Can
17:41
Speaker 3: you gather around you the good guys to work with you?
17:44
Speaker 3: Can you report? Can you follow process? Can you help
17:47
Speaker 3: other people follow process? Execution is key.
17:52
Speaker 1: The middle class, like how much? How much does the
17:54
Speaker 1: middle class make?
17:57
Speaker 3: Good question? It's hard to have numbers, let's say, but
18:03
Speaker 3: what I've observed based on my previous occupations is that
18:09
Speaker 3: in let's say, in ivory costs, you can have middle
18:13
Speaker 3: class talk twinning from one thousand US to even one
18:19
Speaker 3: point five thousand, two thousand, and for ivory costs, then
18:24
Speaker 3: it's it's a nice kind of living. You cannot have
18:28
Speaker 3: access to the best really state property with that kind
18:31
Speaker 3: of money, but you can have a very good living
18:34
Speaker 3: for rent, for rent and for everything. I even question
18:37
Speaker 3: that a guy that makes one point five here lives
18:40
Speaker 3: significantly better than a guy that makes one point five
18:43
Speaker 3: in friends significantly better five US or.
18:46
Speaker 1: Euros thousand, thousand, five hundred dollars.
18:50
Speaker 3: Yeah, one point five thousand dollars.
18:54
Speaker 1: A month, a month, that's how much money make.
18:57
Speaker 3: Yeah, you can have that, you can live all Yeah, definitely, yeah,
19:02
Speaker 3: definitely yeah, yeah, imagine that. Let's say the common salaries
19:09
Speaker 3: that you find in restaurants, in the hotels, in construction
19:13
Speaker 3: work is around roughly two hundred and two hundred and
19:18
Speaker 3: fifty euros US a month month, yes, for construction, for
19:24
Speaker 3: construction entry level I mean for waiting tables, entry level jobs.
19:31
Speaker 3: Those are numbers. Yeah, so when you reached one thousand.
19:36
Speaker 1: You make one a month. Yeah, middle class.
19:39
Speaker 3: It's hard to define, let's say, because we don't have
19:42
Speaker 3: the right stats numbers. But you're good enough that you
19:45
Speaker 3: can start to invest to save. And that's why you
19:48
Speaker 3: have to be smart, because most people who have salary
19:51
Speaker 3: gap positive salary gap instead of keeping the same lifestyle
19:56
Speaker 3: and the extra is for saving or investing. All of
19:59
Speaker 3: a sudden, then they change life time spending.
20:01
Speaker 1: How much money do you need to be rich here?
20:03
Speaker 1: What monthly or or just yeah, somebody, it's like because
20:09
Speaker 1: I'm asking, because people think a lot. Some people are
20:11
Speaker 1: thinking about moving to Africa, okay, And in America they
20:14
Speaker 1: might be middle class, yeah, but here they might they
20:18
Speaker 1: might be rich.
20:19
Speaker 3: Right, what is the middle class salary for New York
20:22
Speaker 3: is crazy?
20:23
Speaker 1: Let's say just America America. I would say a hundred
20:29
Speaker 1: thousand dollars.
20:30
Speaker 3: With that kind of money, you're you're well off here really, Yeah,
20:34
Speaker 3: a single person of family.
20:36
Speaker 1: I mean you're just saying, like in middle America, if
20:38
Speaker 1: you got.
20:39
Speaker 3: If you have two household and you make that kind
20:41
Speaker 3: of money, you have a business that can be operated
20:44
Speaker 3: from distance. And then you work from here and you
20:47
Speaker 3: make that kind of money, Yeah, you can invest.
20:50
Speaker 1: If you make let's say five thousand dollars a moth, Yeah,
20:54
Speaker 1: then you're you're doing good.
20:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're doing really good.
20:57
Speaker 1: You're wealthy. Now you're not wealthy, but you're doing.
21:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're doing good because you have a wealthy class
21:02
Speaker 3: here that I believe is in the same level as
21:06
Speaker 3: the wealthy class wherever you Yeah, in France or in
21:10
Speaker 3: the US. It's not like let's say common, but you
21:13
Speaker 3: can find some of them.
21:15
Speaker 2: So you said you started in hospitality.
21:17
Speaker 1: I want to reverse engineer it.
21:19
Speaker 2: There's somebody right now that's working in hospitality, maybe at
21:22
Speaker 2: the noon what were you taking notes on. What were
21:26
Speaker 2: you learning that you're implementing now.
21:28
Speaker 3: Okay, in hospitality, I learned the execution. If you have
21:38
Speaker 3: a group of twenty person that comes to your hotel
21:41
Speaker 3: in twenty minutes, they want their rooms, they don't want
21:43
Speaker 3: to talk to you, they don't want excuses, they're tired,
21:46
Speaker 3: they're hot. You need to deliver. There is an ending
21:51
Speaker 3: time and that is something that helped me a lot
21:54
Speaker 3: to help my team reach that level of demanding expectations
21:58
Speaker 3: that no excuses and when you work in hospitality, no
22:02
Speaker 3: excuses possible. There is a human being that will come
22:04
Speaker 3: to you shout at you, be mad at you. Right now,
22:07
Speaker 3: you cannot invent something, So execution is the first thing. Anticipation, Like,
22:12
Speaker 3: I don't believe that's my philosophy that you cannot have
22:15
Speaker 3: bad employees, but you can have negligent leadership. For example,
22:21
Speaker 3: if you as a leader, you make sure you prepare
22:24
Speaker 3: your team to anticipate, to ask the right question, to
22:28
Speaker 3: implement the right moves, and as well, you make sure
22:32
Speaker 3: you accept the demand that you can respond to. Because
22:36
Speaker 3: some business owner, just for the appetite of the revenue,
22:40
Speaker 3: then they will say okay, yes, come in. I can
22:43
Speaker 3: accept you, I can welcome you, but you can't. It's
22:45
Speaker 3: better you say okay, look, I can welcome only fifty
22:47
Speaker 3: of you, not one hundred of you, and do it well.
22:50
Speaker 3: Then say okay, come the one hundred and then be
22:52
Speaker 3: shouting at your team because they're unable to perform at
22:55
Speaker 3: one hundred people. You want it to welcome. So leadership
22:58
Speaker 3: and smart and unarticipating leadership is key. And lastly, something
23:03
Speaker 3: that is very important is to adapt to many cultures.
23:06
Speaker 3: I think it's overrated to talk about Africa. Now you
23:11
Speaker 3: have North Africa, and you have many North Africa, you
23:14
Speaker 3: have West Africa, and you have many in West Africa,
23:17
Speaker 3: and Central Africa and South Africa, East Africa. When you
23:21
Speaker 3: work in the hospitality, then you see all of those
23:24
Speaker 3: culture combining and working together and you know how to
23:28
Speaker 3: adapt to each and every one of them. So one
23:31
Speaker 3: thing that we should do is to limit our reference
23:34
Speaker 3: and I do it myself also all of the time
23:36
Speaker 3: as Africa and start being more precise. And like we said,
23:39
Speaker 3: we say New York in Miami, then we need to
23:42
Speaker 3: get in that point where we say dakr abijon yam
23:46
Speaker 3: ny Rugby et cetera, et cetera.
23:48
Speaker 1: Point taking, but I'm.
23:51
Speaker 3: The first one. We still also do it.
23:56
Speaker 1: I think that it has power both ways. It has
24:00
Speaker 1: power as a collective Africa. Yeah, but it also has power,
24:03
Speaker 1: like you said, just not looking at it as as
24:06
Speaker 1: one either. Because for people, when something happens in one place,
24:11
Speaker 1: then it's just like something happens in Congo. Then it
24:15
Speaker 1: happens like that's how people are thinking, Like that's what's like.
24:18
Speaker 1: They don't understand. It's like it could be an eight
24:20
Speaker 1: hour flight. It'll be the same thing. Like it's not
24:22
Speaker 1: that happened in Mexico. You wouldn't be looking at New
24:23
Speaker 1: York City. That's a very key point.
24:28
Speaker 3: Let me emphasize on something, let's say twenty years ago
24:33
Speaker 3: in the hospitality in Africa, let's say Ivory Coasts, Senegal, Guyia,
24:40
Speaker 3: sixty five percent to seventy percent of your travelers where
24:45
Speaker 3: European or North American sixty five to seventy percent. The
24:52
Speaker 3: drawback of that is that they are very sensitive to
24:57
Speaker 3: changes in reputation, changes in Lensky, changes in political landscape,
25:02
Speaker 3: et cetera. You hear about COVID, everybody leaves Iboa, everybody
25:06
Speaker 3: leaves political issue. Everybody leaves Africa. Now there is a
25:11
Speaker 3: shift were now about sixty percent of your travelers come
25:16
Speaker 3: from Africa, North Africa, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Mali, the Gambia, Ghana, Nigeria,
25:24
Speaker 3: which means that exactly what you say it when a
25:27
Speaker 3: guy from Nigeria hears about a conflict in let's say,
25:31
Speaker 3: Lomy is not going to be scared to go to Abijan.
25:34
Speaker 3: He knows the landscape, which is something that is very
25:37
Speaker 3: good for us to have our own autonomous local market
25:43
Speaker 3: that is very very important and it's growing.
25:45
Speaker 1: Now.
25:45
Speaker 3: That's why I'm saying, let's not only focus on luxury goods,
25:51
Speaker 3: let's also learn how to manufacture let's say, mid scale
25:56
Speaker 3: ranch projects or even mass market products.
26:00
Speaker 2: Which which markets do you like outside of the car
26:03
Speaker 2: obviously you broughte up Ivory close is definitely one concrey
26:09
Speaker 2: with just there in Guinea. What market is in West
26:12
Speaker 2: Africa or are there in East Africa as well?
26:15
Speaker 1: You mentioned I Robi.
26:16
Speaker 3: Been let's say, from a very subjective standpoint, Bena because
26:24
Speaker 3: also I'm from Haiti both my parents, although I've never been,
26:30
Speaker 3: and Benna has been doing a really great work for
26:35
Speaker 3: the like ten years. The president has officially announced that
26:39
Speaker 3: he will leave democratically, and which is a big step
26:43
Speaker 3: for African countries. The African countries are so much in
26:49
Speaker 3: the the appetite to develop than when you give them stability,
26:55
Speaker 3: it's skyrocks. So the first gift we should wish for
26:59
Speaker 3: Africa is political stability with Jane stability and Binan has
27:04
Speaker 3: shown that. And Bena is doing a crazy great work
27:07
Speaker 3: with the new Softel hotel with the events they do
27:10
Speaker 3: at the end of the year every end of December,
27:13
Speaker 3: which is very very very high demand and great events
27:17
Speaker 3: if you love music. They have also with that where
27:20
Speaker 3: they do the goodun days. Also it is a great work.
27:23
Speaker 3: The city is very clean. And let's say also I
27:26
Speaker 3: look at Guyana right now. I know you've been there recently,
27:31
Speaker 3: and also there is a huge appetite to build to
27:34
Speaker 3: develop and they are very very ambitious. You've talked to
27:38
Speaker 3: Chon I think recently and is an example of aification
27:41
Speaker 3: of that. Let's say I've been impressed with Morocco. I've
27:46
Speaker 3: been impressed with Morocco. I was in Morocco twenty years ago,
27:50
Speaker 3: fifteen years ago, ten years ago, every five years ago, there,
27:53
Speaker 3: and I said, what's going on? How are they able
27:56
Speaker 3: to execute that quick? Their vision? Impressed with the moss,
28:02
Speaker 3: the hotels, how thin it is. It's not perfect, as
28:05
Speaker 3: you can hear recently, there are some protests, and nothing
28:08
Speaker 3: is perfect. But when you look from an outside point
28:11
Speaker 3: of view, I can see from a subjective point of view,
28:14
Speaker 3: the progress. Let's say, those are the countries I'm looking
28:18
Speaker 3: at right now.
28:20
Speaker 1: Well, thank you man, thank you for taking your time.
28:22
Speaker 1: I appreciate you. Thank you for taking your time. Really
28:24
Speaker 1: got a lot of great insight pleasure.
28:27
Speaker 3: And I'm very happy because I have my cousins in
28:32
Speaker 3: the US, East Rance, New Jersey, in New York, in Boston,
28:37
Speaker 3: in Miami, and I'm always happy when they ask about
28:41
Speaker 3: Africa and they want to discover their roots because, let's say,
28:46
Speaker 3: twenty years ago, it was not something that was obvious
28:49
Speaker 3: for a black American to say I'm from Africa. And
28:53
Speaker 3: now I don't know if it's thanks to the AfroB
28:55
Speaker 3: it's thanks to the marketing, thanks to Wakanda, thanks to
28:57
Speaker 3: I don't know, but it's becoming more and more brandy
29:00
Speaker 3: to say I'm from Africa. I don't mind the reason.
29:03
Speaker 3: The key is that we're getting together, and the ability
29:07
Speaker 3: for Black African and Black American and Black French to
29:11
Speaker 3: come together as a whole and to collaborate as a
29:14
Speaker 3: high scale without unhealthy competition. That's the main asset that
29:18
Speaker 3: we can wish for us.
29:21
Speaker 1: That's the point.
29:23
Speaker 3: Appreciate it, man pleasure. I see