# Africa’s Real Estate Boom Is Just Getting Started | How to Invest Safely-MP3

An episode of [Earn Your Leisure](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1450211392), 10 Jun 2026, 29 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/8dbc4f54-a337-4481-9ef2-b355012b0a3d/5b6eb9a9-974b-4def-8913-b46100c5b090/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=eac4c628-29cb-469a-b5c8-b355012b0a48

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## Transcript

[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

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