Embarking on a new venture can be both daunting and exhilarating, but what does it take to leap across continents and dive into the entrepreneurial waters of Ghana? Join us as Rush Asare, founder of Akkadian Limited, shares his riveting journey from the United States to the heart of Accra, where he established a beacon for the diaspora aiming to build homes in their motherland. From the intricate web of legalities in Ghanaian business to establishing a bedrock of trust in international real estate, Rush's narrative is nothing short of a masterclass in resilience and innovation.
When fate throws a mentor into your path, the trajectory of your life can veer into unexpected, yet prosperous, territories. Such was the case for me, as a chance encounter in the gym spiraled into a whirlwind of mentorship and personal development. Analyzing the pivotal shifts from corporate fidelity to wealth creation, Rush and I pull back the curtain on the strategies that safeguard an entrepreneur's journey – touching upon the vitality of a clear vision, a financial cushion, and the fortitude to prioritize family security over business whims.
Finally, no entrepreneurial saga is complete without the trials and triumphs of growth and diversification. As we weave through Rush's multifaceted world – from pineapple farms to YouTube content creation – we celebrate the tenacity required to not only start small but to also embrace a myriad of investment avenues. With lessons on the delicate dance of quality versus speed in construction, and a peek into the potential of technology to streamline operations, this episode is a treasure trove for anyone looking to infuse their business ventures with a dose of Ghanaian grit and wisdom.
Watch the video episode of this on YouTube - https://linktr.ee/konnectedminds
Embarking on a new venture can be both daunting and exhilarating, but what does it take to leap across continents and dive into the entrepreneurial waters of Ghana? Join us as Rush Asare, founder of Akkadian Limited, shares his riveting journey from the United States to the heart of Accra, where he established a beacon for the diaspora aiming to build homes in their motherland. From the intricate web of legalities in Ghanaian business to establishing a bedrock of trust in international real estate, Rush's narrative is nothing short of a masterclass in resilience and innovation.
When fate throws a mentor into your path, the trajectory of your life can veer into unexpected, yet prosperous, territories. Such was the case for me, as a chance encounter in the gym spiraled into a whirlwind of mentorship and personal development. Analyzing the pivotal shifts from corporate fidelity to wealth creation, Rush and I pull back the curtain on the strategies that safeguard an entrepreneur's journey – touching upon the vitality of a clear vision, a financial cushion, and the fortitude to prioritize family security over business whims.
Finally, no entrepreneurial saga is complete without the trials and triumphs of growth and diversification. As we weave through Rush's multifaceted world – from pineapple farms to YouTube content creation – we celebrate the tenacity required to not only start small but to also embrace a myriad of investment avenues. With lessons on the delicate dance of quality versus speed in construction, and a peek into the potential of technology to streamline operations, this episode is a treasure trove for anyone looking to infuse their business ventures with a dose of Ghanaian grit and wisdom.
Watch the video episode of this on YouTube - https://linktr.ee/konnectedminds
You're looking at these big companies. Most of them started small, from the garage. Most people just want to come in the suit and office and a fancy setup. That's the problem. Get your fingernails dirty and start with what you have.
Speaker 2:Number one business and self-development podcast, connected Minds podcast. So you created a real estate company in Ghana, absolutely and specifically constructions company, right, right In a time where the world was just going crazy. We didn't know what was happening. People thought we were all going to die. The world was going to come to an end 2020. Why did you make such a decision at that time, when places were locked down?
Speaker 1:Right During COVID, I was in America. So I think 2019 is when I decided to move to Ghana. But, as you all know, you have to prepare before you come here because it's not easy. So I wanted to build a house right. I bought the land in 2016. So 2019 is when I decided to build a house. It took a year and a half to build it. So I came to build a house right. I bought the land in 2016. So 2019 is when I decided to build a house. It took a year and a half to build it. So I came to Ghana in 2021. That's when I moved, but the company was registered in 2020.
Speaker 1:Now the reason why we created a company which is Arcadian Limited is to solve the issue of people sending money back home for somebody to build for them.
Speaker 1:Most of the time, they send the money to relatives to bill for them, because that's the only people they know, and I call it financial stress, not that they are bad people. Most people have never seen that amount of money before and they've had. You know, when we all grown up, we have what we want to buy and stuff like that, and you send that money to the account they don't know what to do with it and they will spend your money right. And it was a constant problem that people will be complaining and crying about working hard. You can't come here every six months and build and go back right unless you are coming to stay here. Most people are working a nine to five. They can't leave for a long period of time. So we started out to kind of solve that issue by giving people insurances and actually delivering, taking money and using it for what it's supposed to be Now. So it was created in 2020 while COVID was ongoing.
Speaker 1:So I was locked down, just like you know everybody else, but you know I was locked down and I was building a house, still was trading in the stock market during COVID, so COVID was actually good for me.
Speaker 2:Sorry to the people.
Speaker 1:You know who's trying to do that During that time was really good in the market, for people who were in the market, so that helped me a lot, made me move faster. My plan was five years, but shout out to the market it was cut down to a year and a half. I made my way to Ghana. So, yeah, when I came here, usually we used to get business to my father or people who've seen my house. And then, because my business partner is who built my house as well, and it was kind of like a model right, like this is what we can do, and I went through the process, though I'm part of the company, we went through the process just to have proof. Like we have insurances for your building, first of all, and we insure the money that you give to us, the first 30% that you send to us, because most construction is you pay one third, one third, then one third, and then we retain like a portion of the money, usually about 5% to 10%, depending on the cost of the building. As for defects Because, as we all know, building is never perfect. When you are done, you come in, you flush, there's a little leakage here, whatever might happen, it rained, we have to call us in to come and fix it. If we don't, you use that money to fix it, so we have to solve it. We have six months defense period and once all of that is done, we request for the final payment. So we finish building your house. But you owe us, um, yeah, you hold on to some of the money to make sure everything is fine before we take. At the end and the process was so good I'm like this is going to be a banger. So we're going to use this in ghana, because me personally, I've never heard of it before.
Speaker 1:I came here. I'm sure it's this, but I didn't. I didn't have access to it. So, um, I came here. My father's friends were using us and people who know me, but it was slow. And then, you know, I wanted to do something totally different as well, so I came in. I have a company called lavi and basically, um, I bought a car wash. I'm in court right now. I bought a car wash, an operating car wash, and I was going to build a minimum on it. So I did a design, I got a permit and everything. I renovated the car wash and I ended up in court, and that was the main thing I was doing in ghana.
Speaker 1:Like you know, I have a gym in there. I'm a. You know, I have a gym in there. I'm a big gym guy. I have a gym in there. I have a rooftop. You know, I have a restaurant. My wife has a salon in there, barbershop, kind of like a lifestyle thing.
Speaker 1:Everything all inclusive was even trying to do forest in there. A lot of stuff, a lot of shops. So somebody was frustrating me, trying to get money from me. I got a title and all that stuff, but he took me to court to frustrate me. So it's almost two years now, but it's almost over. It was never a case to begin with, but he managed to waste two years of my my time and I was very bored. So I decided to jump on YouTube and I don't know what happened. I just jumped on. Youtube wasn't planned and just you know share my story of you know moving to Ghana and then the rest is history. And that led on to getting a lot of clientele from youtube and that was never the plan, but I saw it after the first month I saw how youtube can help this business and now we are building for a lot of people. We've actually we sell land as well. I don't want to touch land at all because of the issues usually quite a lot of issues, isn't it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I figured it out. I haven't sold land to anybody that has zero, so I started selling land as well by dealing with the royal family in the area that I'm used to and they introduced me to because royal families are connected. So I got to the source, not somebody we're selling, but they're all owners of the land, like the people that actually the land trades back to them. So I started going from there and I sold land to over 50 people. I haven't had any issues at all with nobody Right, and now I'm building a gated community on a 30 acre project that we are working on called Acadian City. So we are hoping to sell houses, maybe starting next month. Right now we are just doing the rows and we just finished to a point where we have to do a bridge and then enter.
Speaker 2:You've only been in Ghana for like three years, isn't it? Yes, Like fully yes.
Speaker 1:I've fully been in Ghana for three years. Yeah, the first two years was hell, or maybe the first year and eight months was hell.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I didn't make a dime. It was all problems on top of problems Losing money. It wasn hell. Yeah, I didn't make a dime. It was all problems on top of problems losing money. It wasn't a joke. As a matter of fact, I questioned was it worth it? At one point, like, did I really have to do this? I was. I was doing really well in america, right, I was doing really, really, really well. So I went to school to become an accountant. So I got my undergraduate master's both in accounting. I did my internship with kpmg and then I worked for them for only two months and I quit because I striked big in the stock market. So I felt like it didn't make sense. So I came to Ghana with a lot of money right in my pocket to come in.
Speaker 1:Initially, I was moving to Ghana because I had this friend who's really wealthy, who was actually opening my eyes. This is the reason why I came to Ghana Before. Ghana is a place where you come when you're ready to come and die. That was the mindset If you go back to maybe 2017, all the way back, because my parents took me there in 2007. So between 2007 to 2013, the mindset is Ghana. We come to visit, have fun. One month, two months, you go back to America, you work, you build some house and then when you're ready to die, you come here, enjoy your last 10 years, whatever, and then you leave. That was the mindset.
Speaker 1:But this guy really opened my eyes, like first of all to the corporate environment, because I was a hardworking student trying to get you know just straight A's and work for the corporation right, like that's what our parents want. Become a doctor, an accountant, respectable. So I became an accountant, flying grades right, and this guy is kind of from a very wealthy family. He always we used to work out together. So I met him in the gym and he liked how disciplined I was. I was in the military, by the way. I was in the US I'm from 18 to 22.
Speaker 1:So I've been working out since I joined the military, like five to six days a week for the past 13 years or so now right. So he liked how I worked out, how disciplined I was. He couldn't make it consistently like three days and he'll get lazy. So I took him under my belt and we're working out together and I got him in great shape. But he was in return. He was sharing stuff that I didn't know. He's from a really wealthy family. Just to give you a concept of that, he sold his family, his business, for $25 million and moved to Switzerland at the time that I was moving to Ghana. So he would say stuff like oh, these corporations don't care about you, Like you could do so much better, Like it's just a little germy here and there. It was totally different from like what you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:It was just totally different. So at first I'm like to me it was okay, I'm working so hard in school, I'm trying to do this. But this guy is saying something that was like, oh, these are a bunch of you know a-holes, like they don't care about you, Like he never say anything good about big corporations. And I'm like, okay, this is a bit weird. I didn't take it in right away, but then where he got me was he started sending me articles of African countries doing really well and when they measure by GDP, because he reads a lot.
Speaker 1:Oh, reading is another thing I used to do all my schoolwork but I never used to read on my own, Like buy a book and read Never. So he started suggesting books and stuff to me Like, oh, you should read this book, so that I read like four books. And I said that year I read like 70 books. I got hooked and ever since I became a reader. So he really helped me out a lot, I think. So, um, he was kind of like a mentor. He was a bit older. At the time I was working out with him, I was like maybe 24, he was like 38 so you know, that's the power of association, right, absolutely?
Speaker 2:you spend time with someone at the gym and what you've known for all these years. Very quickly try to change that mindset absolutely and look at you now yeah, definitely thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1:I would have been busy, you know yeah probably like uh fourth years. Yeah, fourth year incorporates paying 50 of my earned income and all that stuff, yeah, yeah because you don't get to write anything off. And all that right though I was an accountant. It's basic knowledge, but our programming right? It's like we are so scared to yeah, you're programmed to work Absolutely.
Speaker 2:I mean, these are things that Kiyosaki usually say in his books yeah, yeah, yeah that you know we train people to go to school, to come and get a job Absolutely. But that shift, that mental shift from not being a government worker to championing your life, it can happen like that if you pay attention.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and once you go there it's hard to go back. It's really hard you can't go back.
Speaker 1:If you go back it's for temporary to get something, and you go back to where you can, you become unemployable. That's what I call myself. Once you take that freedom, you become unemployable. Overqualified, overqualified, let's put it that way. So, yeah, overqualified, let's put it that way. So, um, yeah, so you know, he said this gym, gym thing. He said what do I want to do? Like he asked me that question oh, that's another thing.
Speaker 1:I never thought like, okay, and my whole life I've been doing really well, like I care about my you know credit score, you know, uh, paying everything on time, you know, getting good grades, like your average hard-working middle class, and there's nothing wrong with that. But he was trying to pull me into the rich mindset and I was like they know exactly what they want. Exactly what they want and you know, it's like you would think one day I want to buy a house, take a mortgage, the easy route. But he was really challenging me with a question like what do you want to do? I'm like I want to build a gym in Ghana one day. That's what I said. He said so I'll work for maybe 10 years. But I said no, you don't have to, you can do it now you can raise money. So he would say stuff like this. So I said, ok, I will try it. He said, okay, but I'm not going to. You know, I'm married. I'm not going to come to ghana and rent and take this huge risk, um, with no money and hoping that people give me money to build a gym. It's too risky for me and my wife. So I'm gonna do my way. I hear you, but you know, I'm gonna build a house.
Speaker 1:Before I come in, I was able to, you know, set up some residual income that's enough to feed me and my family. Once I have a house, like, I'll be fine, everything can fail and I'll be fine. That's enough to feed me and my family. Once I have a house Like I'll be fine, everything can fail and I'll be fine. And that's why I'm still here. If it wasn't for that, I would have been gone because of this court situation that put a hold to everything I was trying to do in Ghana. Right, so I came here my own way.
Speaker 1:By the time I came, I never thought this would happen. I had my own money. Well, by the time I came, I never thought this would happen. I have my own money to do everything. I didn't need a dime from anybody when I came.
Speaker 1:So I came in here, I bought land by the road side, spent a lot of money on a car wash, I renovated it and I'm building the minimum around it because, just like you know your situation, you don't want to take a risk and go for bare land. I wanted something, that there's something on there, right, yeah, because it's quite expensive and I don't want to take the risk. So I went with something. Somebody's opening a business on there. Somebody saw the opportunity of a young guy coming from America. He thought he can start and all that. So I ended up fighting him and I ended up in court because he wanted to delay the work. But we are almost to. It's been two years now. So that was hell.
Speaker 1:But that was my first two years.
Speaker 1:It was hell. I bought the land I think two years in Ghana. I bought the land and then this guy was stressing me out back and forth for about three months and I never budged. And then finally he went to court and put an injunction on it, hoping that I would come and see him. That's what he kept saying.
Speaker 1:But I went to see him but he was being unreasonable. He wanted me to buy the land they gave from him. He didn't have the right documentation. I got a title, so I'm like let's do this. And I sat away in the court and it's over, literally, uh, just waiting for a judgment. There is no way I can lose. He doesn't have a case. So, god being so good, youtube actually helped my business. I think I'm actually grateful for that guy. Yeah, I'm super grateful for that guy because he educated me tremendously on the real estate space and land, how land works, what's a lojo owner, all of that like composite plan, all is all of it. Like I came out of that with my phd in land right and I have used that knowledge to help a lot of people.
Speaker 1:Like I said, I've sold land to more than 50 people, no issue because of this. And now I have the right connections because we need that in ghana. I know who to call because I know we are the rightful owners. If somebody coming to act, act up, we will solve that immediately. We have people at the you know, at the headquarters police station. All us you need, you need that. All these people will come and just cause issues in ghana. Right? So that was absolutely needed, honestly, because I was going to have just a minimum. Now I have a big real, which was already there, but I don't think it would be this big If I had it easy with a minimal. I personally believe that.
Speaker 2:You know, there's a type of person that you have to be to be able to climb the entrepreneurship ladder. Now, these days, people are using the word loosely Right, but you have to be a certain type of person absolutely absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 1:If you are not strong, you will. You'll fold. Most people will fold under the pressure. It wasn't a joke. You'll fall under the pressure. I've been chased, you know, I have been chased, uh, threatened. All that right but right. But you have to have that mental fortitude and just believe. You have to believe in whatever you see in your mind that is going to work.
Speaker 1:Right, like we wanted to develop this, me and my business partner, we were talking about doing acres of, you know, ghetto community. That's a lot of money, right. You need like $1 million just for the land, and now you got to do the road and all that. How are we going to do that? Right, it's just just to start like that. Right, it's going to take time, but we were ready to do it, but just knowing that we wanted to do it, you know, I just, we just put, we, we watered into existence. It happened so quickly, right, and we didn't even have to pay the money up front. You get it. So, yeah, you do have to just push. You don't have to stop the problem. Can, can, push, keep pushing, keep pushing. And that's what it takes in Ghana, because you will face the problems, you will face it.
Speaker 2:And not even just Ghana, right? Whatever part of the world that you are trying to do business, it's almost as if, as soon as you start, somebody else is threatened. That you've started, absolutely, and they want to come after you? Yeah, right, they want to take something away from you? Yeah, and you've got to be ready for that fight. But it's even worse in Ghana or any part of Africa.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's much, much, much harder here. You know, in the States and UK sometimes somebody has registered the brand before you. They got the what do you call it? The trademark. They got the trademark and you didn't know you used it. I've heard a story like that. Once you get big they're coming for the check right, or they try to shut you down that happens a lot or the government is coming after you. But here this is a big organization, it takes time, like here. It's a bit different.
Speaker 2:Because it's like individuals just coming after you. Anybody can come after you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, the moment you start, it's like Anyone can come after you.
Speaker 2:It's crazy Because I remember, you know, the whole trademark issue. There was a company that I had and you know we were running pretty well. We had letters from the other competitors, lawyers here and there, and we had to fight our way through, you know.
Speaker 1:So it happens, it happens is that a common thing in uk, because I've heard a lot of that in uk. People come in for somebody using their trademark yeah, it does happen.
Speaker 2:It does happen and it happened to the small boys a lot it's just unfortunately, you know sometimes it's just content.
Speaker 2:You know, it's the people you entrust to build the site. Then they copy something from somebody else's website. You know what I mean? It's just so many things that happen, you know, and we had to fight. We spent quite a bit of money to you know, fight cases in court and stuff. But hey, it's part of the game, it's part of the game. It's part of the game You've got to. It's interesting, right that you've got a company in Ghana that are building properties for people in the diaspora. It's amazing, thank you. But why should they trust you?
Speaker 1:Well, first of all, you're going to trust because of you know we do have people that come on my channel to test the money, like showing their property, that you know I bought this from Rush and all that, so the trust is there. But at the same time, as I said, we give you insurances. So before you send money to us, well, the way we so let's say you come, you come to us, you have your land already. Right, you don't have to have your land, but you have your land already. Usually that's what we ask you. I want to build a house, do you have a land? Yes, I have land. Okay, cool, do you know what kind of house you want? Maybe you don't know? Fine, four bedrooms, three bedrooms. We had that conversation. Then we go to your you know your design phase. After the design phase and we have, okay, the design phase goes like this we bill you for the design phase, you pay one third of it up front and then we come up with a concept, what you say, you want it, you wanted a gym, you wanted a three bedroom, four bath, whatever you say. You wanted this kind of house. We're going to present it to you in a 3d form and you're gonna with a floor plan and you're gonna say, okay, change this, change all, it's gorgeous, I have nothing to change. Okay, now you pay one third. It's time for you to pay additional one third, making two thirds so we can move into the detailed design. Uh, drawings, once we finish with detailed drawings and we print it out, then you pay your final one third. So that one. You are really not taking any risk. We give receipts immediately. So that one. There is no insurances there. We also have an office, so people come to office. It's gone. People come to office, though it's online. They will send somebody to come to the office to see where we are. Not a problem, doesn't happen often, but it happens especially when we are selling land. That happens more often where we are selling land. I don't think so so much with design.
Speaker 1:Once we finish with the design, you can take the design, go find your own contractor to build it. No problem, right? Some people want us to go ahead and use our network to get you a permit, because permit can take some people a year to not with us, because this is what we do, so we know people in the respective places to get a permit within two months, less than two months, months get a permit for you and there we go. So we do the permit for you and now it's time to build. We're going to do something called BOQ, where bill of quantities, where we're going to calculate how much your building is going to cost, including our professional fees, materials, all that stuff. That's one option you can. Another option is you can buy your own materials, bring your own workers and you just bring us in for supervision. There are people who are already doing their project before they found us, but sending money to, so they just send money to us but they have their own workers and stuff and maybe they might want us to give this person. That people use us for that. That one.
Speaker 1:There's no insurance but because of the trust, they do that and we don't have a problem. We are just here to help people out. Other people have just bought all the materials and we just come in with our own laborers. We charge for just the work, laborers for supervision, and some people go full force. That's most people in the diaspora. They will just send the money to us. That's when it's insured. So those are worse, depending on how much the building costs. Sometimes it's too high.
Speaker 1:Let's say your building is $800,000. We're not going to tell you to send one third. We're going to take you forever for most people. So we're going to work, we're going to be reasonable with you. See what price point we can work with at least the substructure. And then we're going to give you an insurance. So you get a mobilization payment insurance because you're giving us the money to mobilize. We're not going to use our money to go build for you and then hoping you pay. It doesn't work that way. So that money is insured. The amount that you are sending in the beginning is insured and usually the way we go about this is supposed to be more so that once we finish.
Speaker 1:So I'll break it down to you. The mobilization payment let's use a hundred thousand dollar house to make the number simple for me. You know we don't do public math. But a hundred thousand, I think I'll do good with that. So a hundred thousand dollar house, you're paying. Let's say you're retaining ten percent of it for defects, as I mentioned to you earlier. So now, if you divide that into three, it's 30k because you're retaining the ten thousand dollars at the end of it. Right, you're going to pay after six months of the project completion, right. So in this scenario we're taking, we're giving you 10 retention, uh, retention for the defects. Sometimes it could be five percent, it's between ten and five depending. So you are holding on to ten thousand. So if you are building your project, we also discuss the years that you want the project done. So if you are building your project in two years, you know that you're going to owe. You can have 90,000 and build in two years, but you need 10,000 six months after.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:You get where I'm coming from Because of the contract.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So you're sending 30,000. That money is insured. We have to send you insurance. We are insuring the mobilization. It's called mobilization payment. That's what we're going to start your work with. You can call the insurance company and say, hey, these guys gave me this insurance, that my money is insured to you guys. There is a number on the insurance number and all that stuff. Is it true? Will you guys actually give me the money back? If these guys run away with your money and they will say, absolutely, it's insured, then the entire building is insured while it's under our care. So if you are doing it for two years, the builders insured. So what happened in turkey? There's an earthquake, anything can happen. You actually get your money back from the insurance company because everything collapsed and it protects us as well. So theft we insure against theft as well. If somebody steals something on site like towels and stuff like that, we can handle it.
Speaker 1:We just because this insurance company works like the more money you come for the higher it is so we haven't had a situation where we had to go for the insurance company or they came for us ever, because there are situations where the boys will steal some paint towels. But these are minor stuff that we can take care of. We can take care of and then we'll move on. Now you send a 30%. You will agree, you've done your investigation, you are satisfied that if you run out with your money, it's not trust anymore. If you run out with your money, you do what you call them and you get your money back right With your insurance that we sent to you. Usually we use Vanguard yeah, they are pretty good, they have others. Use Vanguard yeah, they are pretty good, they have others, but that's what we are with now and Vanguard Assurance, and then that 30%. Let's say your foundation is $10,000. Just to make the number simple for public math's sake right.
Speaker 1:So your foundation is $10,000. We took $30,000 from you. We're going to agree that per each stage, we're going to refund you because we have to pay you back. It's agree that per each stage, we're going to refund you because we have to pay you back. It's a loan to us. The mobilization payment is a loan to us for us to start your work, but we are not bailing for the work yet, but we're not. We're also not using our money to build your, your house for you.
Speaker 1:So the 30,000 is with us, we do. The foundation is ten thousand dollars. Now we're supposed to bill you for ten thousand dollars, but we won't. We have an agreement that, per each stage, we will deduct five thousand dollars from the thirty thousand dollars you give us. So instead of you paying ten thousand for the foundation, you pay us five thousand dollars and now you have twenty five thousand dollars with us. So that's how the money goes into the project and by the time you pay for us to build, your structure is already there, there's trust being established and all that. That's when you pay as we go. That is the method that we have. Okay, yeah, oh that's cool.
Speaker 2:Now I'm gonna run through this one quickly. All right, and this is it right. You know, there are a lot of young people, especially here in ghana, right? Um, someone is probably listening to and be like wow, this guy is sharp, I've gone through some of your portfolio and the things you've done. Someone is probably listening to you and be like, wow, this guy is sharp, I've gone through some of your portfolio and the things you've done.
Speaker 1:You had pineapple farming, yes, you had car wash yes, uber business yes, gym Trading.
Speaker 2:Trading. Look, how does one raise capital to start a business? I've got this question that comes in almost all the time. These young people ask how do one raise capital to start a business? I've got this question that comes in almost all the time. These young people ask how do I raise capital? How do I raise capital?
Speaker 1:That is a problem. Most people are so focused on raising capital and I understand the frustration in Ghana, especially because a few friends can come together to raise capital in Ghana If they have. You know You're coming from the West. It's not easy. Let's put it that way. I think the misconception is people think it's easy to get money from the banks in America to start your business, and it's not true. It is not true Unless you have established some sort of viable product that the banks can see that works Right, unless it's friends and family. That's where most people start from, or people max out their credit cards, but unfortunately we don't have that here. So what you can do is to start small. Most people don't want to start small. It's humbling to start small. Right, I started, so I'll give you an example of the pineapple farm. You didn't need a lot of money to start a pineapple farm. It was two acres. I was working with a farmer. I'm not a farmer, I'm an investor. So the two acres we didn't buy. We rented the two acres a farmland it's. It's cheap, right, and you can even go and beg somebody for if you don't have the money, I'm just using this farmland, for example. Now what you need is a circus. The circus you can ask your friends, as you did at one point, I think I heard some story like that. Your friends came together. So it's a way of doing that or having your own money, which is not easy for most people. But this was you can start small. You could start from one plot, because the pineapple, when a, when you harvest, it multiplies by three or four. So you can start small. I just wanted so that two acres. After that about 15 acres. So that two acres, I'm like okay, it was, I was testing the land, I was testing the market, so I didn't buy the land. If it was terrible, that was it. I was gone. Right, I lose like 2k and I'm gone. I just take my l and I go. But when I finished it was good. So I'm like, okay, let's buy 15 acres, I'm gonna build value with the land and I'm gonna go big. Now I don't have't have to buy sockets they're called sockets, the pineapple sockets that can fill up the 15, because I just bought two and multiplied already. So I was going to go to six. Then from the six to 15, I was going to buy more land and then that's how you got to start. You're looking at these big companies. Most of them started small, from the garage, so most people just want to come in the suit and office and a fancy setup. That's the problem. Get your fingernails dirty and start with what you have. That's the problem.
Speaker 1:When I started my youtube channel, you were talking to not to brag, but I was a millionaire. Okay, everything went south. I lost a lot of money in the stock market. When I came to ghana, everything when everything was crashing. It was really crashing during the um, russia, ukraine. When it first started, oh, it was crashing. I was losing money in the market like crazy. Now I got hundreds of thousands of dollars stuck in this car wash that I bought, not making a dime. It was. It was brutal, right.
Speaker 1:So when I started youtube, first of all, I didn't know anything about youtube. I call it the lean startup, instead of me sitting down and saying I need a fancy lighting and I need a cameraman and all that. That's not what I did, because usually it's a good way to go about it if you have it, but if you don't just start with what you have, just start with what you have. And what did I start with? My wife had a ring light. Not that I was so broke, but I was in a position. I was too hot man. I was paying lawyers, nothing. I started YouTube not really to make money. I just wanted to keep myself busy. I didn't think YouTube money is not money, but it helps with the business. This is what I didn't see. It helps with the business I'm doing.
Speaker 1:So I didn't start YouTube to make money on YouTube. I started YouTube because I was bored. I was bored man. I was thinking should I just go back to the safe for some time? I'm glad I didn't, because you need to get some stamina. In Ghana you can't be going in and out. I started on my phone. I started on my phone in the ring light. It's the content People care about quality, but they will forgive you if you're a beginner. Then from there I'm like okay, this is good People are building Instead of paying for a website. I didn't, when you talk about the lean startup, not like I couldn't afford to, uh, pay for a website just pause once again.
Speaker 2:I just love what you said. People forgive you when you are starting out. People forgive you. Yeah, it's only a problem if a big corporation cannot afford the fancy microphones, the beautiful lights, the 4, 4k, 6k, thank you, but you are just starting out, man. You're just starting out.
Speaker 1:And when I started I even told people oh, this is my first video, it's going to suck, the sound quality sucked. As a matter of fact, this is how terrible I was. I did not know the resolution of camera, like 1080p, 4K. I had no idea, so I took a nice 1080p 4k. I had no idea, so I took a nice 1080p video. It was fine when I was editing everything. It was fine when I exported it. My first video was 480p and I had no idea.
Speaker 1:Now I posted the video, I'm watching the video. I'm like the video quality is not the same as when I edited it, like what's going on? So I reached out to my friend in new york and he was like you should pay attention to resolution. I'm like, uh, resolution. Immediately I went on youtube to in New York and he was like you should pay attention to resolution. I'm like, oh, resolution. Immediately I went on YouTube to learn about resolution. So it was like that. Then I learned about cameras, I learned about lighting.
Speaker 1:You can go back. I started the YouTube channel about a year and a half ago. Yeah, almost a year and a half ago. Now you can go back and you will see that I have progressively, you know, gotten better with the lighting. So people forgive you. Just grow with the audience. Ask your audience to grow, respect them and buy the equipment and grow with them. But you don't have to start. You might not even get one view, you don't know, and you are overthinking about raising money and stuff. That's our problem. That's what I think. Just start. Just start with what you have.
Speaker 2:Just start With what you have. Just start From what I know, and maybe more, you've started more than Five businesses in Ghana. Yes, now You've started. You know there is a certain level when a man makes money that they want to diversify very quickly. And there's a reason why that happens, right, because you're trying to build wealth, absolutely. Yeah, at which point do you think it is important for people to begin to diversify?
Speaker 1:Well, diversifying. You know, if business, you have business and you have people who are working not everybody, let's establish this not everybody can, you know, have the mental 42. Everybody can do it, but some people it's not worth it for them and that's okay. But you do have to diversify. So if you have your 95, you're making 150k, 100k. You gotta, you know, get your fuel in the stock market. You know you don't have to trade because that's for professionals. But you can buy index funds where you own a piece of a big, big company. They do the selection for you, the company. If it's the s&p 500, if you know the last 500 company, the last one, is not doing well, they're gonna get, you know, swapped out with another company. You don't have to do anything. Let's put the money in there and with the power of compounding you can never lose with that. You buy some stocks. You are diversified automatically with 500 companies. You know a few of them.
Speaker 1:I think there's a studies that only 10, 10 companies in the s&p 500 is really moving, really moving the s&p 500 forward and, um, the probability of you predicting this is the stock or that it's extremely low. Most professionals actually lose trying to, you know, beat the market like. I beat the market by a far stretch, not because I'm smart, I knew what I was doing, but luck had a lot to do with it as well. Right, god? I personally think God was saying that I want you in Ghana pretty soon, and yes, because the return I was getting was crazy. But that's not, it's too risky for the average person. S&p 500, 10 to 20 years. Put some money in there and you'll become wealthy. It's proven in the past 100 years.
Speaker 1:You cannot lose Work. Put like 5K a year in there, 10k, 20k, the more the better. Just start early. So the power of compound if you can start at 25, the better. Put some money in there. You know, 70% stocks, 30% bonds.
Speaker 1:That's one way of diversifying. You're doing your job. You're swiping some of the money in there. No stress, you have no business. Well, if you have a business, you know you could get sued for whatever. You could lose all the money in there. So you do have to take money out. And then you know the business is an entity in itself. It can fail, but you have other entities.
Speaker 1:So it's important to diversify and also, while you have that active business like us building right now right I'm currently diving into, you have to use technology. So I'm building something very close to zillow zillow in america, like less than enough properties, right, it's linked to I'm doing I've been doing a few brokerages and it's going to be a bit different because I would do a sense of due diligence before it makes it to the website. So when you see something on the website, first believe that it's free from all issues. So it's something I'm working on as well and that the reason why I went with that is because people call me. I get so many calls that rush.
Speaker 1:You know we have big because of this association that I have with the royal family. They are all connected in a way. We have land, that's, you know, lakeview now over a thousand acres. We just got a judgment and we're going to. We want you to come in and help us out, and it's just too much and every time I have to go and shoot a video, it's like me, me, me, me, and it's too much sometimes. So what I'm trying to do is use technology in my favor, where I can actually send a team there to take it, and I've done the work and I will promote instead of me promoting on my YouTube channel. Like this launch, go buy it 60,000,. Of me promoting on my youtube channel. Like this land, go buy it 60 000 every single time in you guys faces. I'm trying to not to do too much of that and rather promote the website. So whatever I have will be on the website. If you want land, check out this website. That's it. So I'm working on that you're doing great you're doing fantastic.
Speaker 2:you know, um, there's one thing that you know. I lived in ghana for quite a bit, up until the age of about 15 years 14 and a half, 15 years and there's one thing that I saw with a lot of businesses first generation businesses they never make it past the first generation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a thing. Here I see that most of the business that did are actually foreign owned, sadly, malcolm.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And they got big because the power of compounding has to be in the long runway. Man, you can become really big. Right, and for us, just that, you know the family. Unfortunately, we have a lot of family issues. So when the founder is not active anymore they're not involved siblings start to fight, or this also happens in the West, but in Uganda it's sweet with parties and stuff like that you become kind of they're not focused and it just goes down right and we don't reinvest when the money comes in. Most africans unfortunately like to cash out and go live their extravagant life and pressing. That's what I've not. I've noticed they don't.
Speaker 1:You know one person in ghana I really admire and respect the castle perco guy yeah yeah, because what he has built, there is no way it's not going to be, you know, generational. Yeah, he's done all right. He also, you know, founded subsidiaries and dive into real estate now, yep, so it's going to be around for a long time. So he did the right, yeah. So you have to diversify, right, and you have to put he. He came out of the business while he was still alive, yes, like he walked away. Yes, but our egos are too big in Africa, right, so we don't know how to walk away. If you notice, jeff Bezos walked away.
Speaker 1:Right, to put somebody there While you are still active to make sure they are doing the right thing. Don't wait till you are weak. You know your sharpness is not there anymore, but that's it does. It does a situation here you should put if you want to put your son in charge, put your son in charge while you're alive. You can fight him and come in, and we don't do that. You wait till you pass away this. Oh, my father owned this and now he's gone, we're gonna take over.
Speaker 2:Who to take over is even a problem yes, because you've groomed no one you know for the youth um listening to this podcast. Maybe this is what they can pick from this that they need to understand that you know that building a business or becoming a person of influence, it's, it's a lifetime thing. You know, and you can't just say today I've got a million dollars and I'm going to chill with all that money, the girls, the alcohol, the drugs, it's going to go away. Even if you have two million pounds in a bank account and it's not growing and you're being stupid about that money, it's going to go.
Speaker 1:Five years is not even enough. Two million is not a lot of money, it's not. You think it's a lot of money, but it's not. It's not Once you, it's not once you. Once you touch money, you see that it's not a lot of money at all. Can fly by like that, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2:So while you're thinking of, you know I want to start a business you know I want to get on the ladder as well. I want to do this.
Speaker 1:Be mindful of your habits absolutely be mindful of your habits. Um me personally, I'm not telling people to get married, but if you have one person that you are focused on, it helps with your focus. Me personally, as somebody who's been we've all been single at one point in life, I've seen the difference. You know, not thinking about who you know. You are chatting. It's even taking time from you. You are chatting this girl you know over and over again. Try to try to win her over. It's wasting your time and it costs a lot of money.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you gotta take on, gotta impress her. You are buying a lot of clothes that you don't need because you're going every day, you have to impress people.
Speaker 2:You're popping bottles that you're not supposed to pop and majority of the girls in ghana. They'll bail you, of course of course so if you're not prepared for that kind of lifestyle, definitely I think you should stay away from it.
Speaker 1:You should absolutely it's not easy to grow a business and then also being in that lifestyle All at the same time. Yeah, to me, me personally. Some people can multitask, I can't. I'm a very straight, one-way kind of guy. I'm in this and that's the way I am, and I just I couldn't add woman problem, I mean just to backtrack what you said.
Speaker 2:I got married pretty early in my life.
Speaker 1:You are quite successful. Do you think that has something to do with it? Major.
Speaker 2:Huge. I mean, we got our first property before we even got married. Awesome, yeah, yeah, before we even got married Awesome. And you know, 70 to 80% of that money was contributed by my wife.
Speaker 1:Oh, amazing.
Speaker 2:Yes, before we even got married. So for me I say to people if you can find that woman who sees your dream, understand your dream, and you can drive that dream, you know it can work absolutely.
Speaker 1:It can certainly work, absolutely, absolutely, yeah, so yeah, that's one thing I'm grateful for that I started. I've been with my wife for 10 years now. You know I was 20. She was 17. I am not Tiger, but we've been together for quite a long time, been married since right before COVID Right. So time flies Amazing Five years now. But yeah, it has helped out tremendously. I've seen a huge difference From when I was single in the Navy to when I settled down. I've definitely seen it. I'm super grateful. I don't regret anything. I'm very happy. That is the situation, because now, honestly, I think it would have made my life a bit difficult, because Ghana is a different world, but you've also realized that a lot of wealthy people start off in a good relationship.
Speaker 2:At least, they start off A lot of wealthy people. They start off in a very good relationship, absolutely. So there's a proof, there's a track record that finding that person and building with them works. Yeah, absolutely. Now let's go back to the major issues with developing properties for people right, what's what's?
Speaker 1:what's the major issues? Oh so, some people don't understand the process, right, some people don't understand the process. Um, they put too much demand on the, on the contractor, and everything is a contractor's fault. Right, everything's a contractor's fault. So an example would be um, let's say you want a project to be completed in four months. The project is too big. We will try to be ambitious and do it right.
Speaker 1:And working with artisans, especially as a matter of fact, I don't think it's gone alone is this is universal. I've heard the stories in america before I. If you are pressuring them, there will be a lot of mistakes. That's easily, you know, rectifiable, right, that's. I told you about the retention. It's easy stuff that you can, but some people want you to come with the speed and in construction, this is all it's in the book. You cannot speed up stuff and get a perfect product right away. It's impossible. Okay, it's. Either you take your time to do it, get it right, the guy that you came to expect, fix this, fix that, complete that, do this, do that, complete that, or you move to it and there's a lot of mistakes to be corrected.
Speaker 2:You just took me back to when I was building this property. I told the architect, look, I want this done in six months. Six months Because I told the architect, look, I want this done in six months, six months because I'm coming to ghana with my family and I need the property. And the guy is going. And I came to ghana and I saw a lot of mistakes and, unfortunately, I had to sack him because I didn't understand yeah, most people don't understand.
Speaker 1:They get extremely frustrated. So what I have done, this is new. I'm very honest, like I will tell you I won't tell you, oh, I'll new. I'm very honest, like I will tell you, I won't tell you all our project. No, I'm very honest, like, if you don't understand the process, it's okay. Me personally, no more speed work Unless it's a very simple project two units and you want like six months, I can do it. But project five bedroom, multiple levels, if it's one level I can do it, I would say no, it would take one year. Because what I know this is most people don't understand the process. When they see it, they get pissed off. When they see the mistakes, they get pissed off. But it's impossible to move with that speed and at the same time, correct at the same time. So what they do this is in books speed, take your time and get it right, because when they do it it's gunning workers, man.
Speaker 1:It's not easy managing these guys. You've been here for a while.
Speaker 1:I'm sure so imagine moving with speed and working with these guys and giving them pressure. They will screw up a lot of stuff and you have to come back and say they didn't plaster here. Well, let's plaster again, let's repaint it. You have to do a few of those or you take your time. So when they do it, you come and check you didn't do this. Well, but that's time, do it again. But we are not moving ahead, we are solving as we go right. So that's that. That that's one thing. Um, yeah, usually speed.
Speaker 2:People want speed and quality and quality at the same time.
Speaker 1:And I have made a conscious decision that you want speed. I'm not your guy, I'm not slow. I could do a project, you know, like two levels, three levels for you one year, because usually we give you six months defense period to solve everything. So if you're giving us four months to build a three-level house and there's issues, that six months all of it will be solved. And when we talk about issues we are not talking about one thing. We never compromise structure, never. It just finishes that people rush through this. The war is not too smooth so we have to. Maybe skim over. It's nothing big, really petty, petty, petty stuff, but it's annoying to see. That's the owner. And the thing with me is I understand people, so when somebody I get where they are coming from, I get it right.
Speaker 1:Some people just don't get the process yeah when you sign a contract about a six months defect and all that still, like when they see that goes out the window, right. So almost everybody I know that built has had issues and got pissed off at the contractor not to me, even friends who are like you know that built before they found we became friends they got pissed off and I have to explain to them, being in this field like, and they have tasted it because maybe they came in the work with a few people coming like imagine supervising these guys from the foundation for six months and you getting the pressure to move fast. You telling somebody a friend of mine from UK he was here while the financial was going on and he told the guy that the fan where he was, he didn't like it to move it here. The guy said, okay, boss, he turned around. He came back the next morning the guy cut the whole ceiling down. Wow, because he didn't understand what he was saying.
Speaker 1:This is the stuff that your contractor is going to on the ground. So it's absolutely not a joke in construction. Yeah, so that's some of the problems, but you know we solve it by not just, we're just not going to do it.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But we make people happy. On the bright side, Most people are extremely happy. We've had people that have tried to build in Ghana but land lose it, but land lose it, but land lose it. And finally they found you and they are just so happy. I've had people who have built a house somewhere. They don't want to go there anymore. The house is just sitting there Cause somebody sold them land somewhere in the forest. They built, they got a generator. They don't go there anymore. And they found me and they're like and they see they don't understand they get pissed off, so we just want to take our time.
Speaker 2:That's all. After more than five businesses in ghana, you've been incorporate, you've been in the navy. Look, every entrepreneur. Every entrepreneur has a why.
Speaker 1:What's your why? What's my why? I love helping people. I truly do love helping people and my why, in Acadian specifically, is the fact that people can work hard and you know, in the States, uk, wherever and they can send money to you, whether that's $4,500 for land, somewhere that we can afford that. But some people cannot even have the time to come here and buy. Even if they come here, they're not on the ground. They will lose their money.
Speaker 1:So me, knowing that I'm the source of somebody buying their first property makes me extremely happy. So that's my why I want to make a difference. I see where the country is going. I see the development and the reason why I chose real estate is because, you know, 20 years from now I can walk down the street like where we are right now construct a three kilometers road, right, it's going to be. Uh, we're starting with 100 homes, we're selling 90 plus behind, and then I've sold a couple lands around and I will keep going. So 20 years from now, I will walk around and see that Ghana was developed and I contributed.
Speaker 2:That's beautiful, that's just beautiful.
Speaker 1:Thank you yeah.
Speaker 2:And look, you're doing amazing stuff. Thank you, and hopefully we'll have some conversations, because I see the synergy, I see that there's a lot that we can discuss.
Speaker 1:Same here. When I watched your interview I was like, okay, you don't see a lot of people like us. I was really impressed man. I'm like okay, this guy did it right, you did it right man.
Speaker 2:And I hit you up straight away because Emutual said nah, you guys need to meet. You know you guys need to meet because I think she could create the connection. But yeah, look, we have a question from our previous guest and the question is what's your life script? You know, what is it that has happened to you that has made you who you are today?
Speaker 1:Everything happens for a reason and you can only connect the dots looking backwards. So believe in a process and just move forward.
Speaker 2:Cool Now from connected minds, motivation or discipline.
Speaker 1:Motivation or discipline. Yeah, you can choose one. Discipline all day. Discipline Motivation is like you know, it's fleeting man. You get motivated for an hour and it's gone. Discipline, it's a lifetime.
Speaker 2:Rush. What's the best advice you've ever received?
Speaker 1:Buy a line in Ghana, because you never know when you're going to need it. That advice was given to me by my father's friend when I had no intentions of coming back to Ghana. I came to Ghana I was 18, 19 at the time. He told me to buy land, and I listened. I don't know why I'm very stubborn when people tell me stuff. I try to analyze it. But I listened and I bought the land. So when I decided to come to Ghana, I so, when I decided to come to Ghana, I didn't have to go and look for land. That was the best advice. Personally, I had the land sitting there already.
Speaker 2:See, I didn't Fantastic right. See the path that's ahead of you. If you decide to take that path, you never go wrong. But if you decide to take somebody else's path, that's where the problem starts. Absolutely, we are all on our own timelines. Yes, time zones. Yes, right, so just just be patient with that. I'd love to take a question for my next guest what is the meaning of life to you?
Speaker 1:I think I should have asked you this question.
Speaker 2:It's actually a very good question. What is the meaning of life to you? I think I should have asked you this question.
Speaker 1:It's actually a very good question. Pose it to your next guest. Oh, you're going to have it, and I kind of have an idea who it is.
Speaker 2:Have you got anything to say to my audience on Connected Minds?
Speaker 1:It's a great podcast. I like what you are doing here. I love it. I love the setup. I love how much um, attention and detail that you've put into this podcast awesome, yeah, the quality is amazing. So, if you've not subscribed and this is coming on youtube yes, kindly do so. It helps a lot. Yeah, and I like the video. You know it helps with the algorithm as well. That's what I would like to. You know, post to your audience and you know. Whatever you want to do, just know that you can start small. It's only a few people that raise money. You know, most people start small.
Speaker 1:One of the biggest companies in Ghana, the Kapsa Perko guy. He said he did susu. He put money on the side for a while and then he took it to do it. So you on the side for a while and then he took it to do it so you could work hard. Whether that's amazing work, that's what I say. I'm not going to be amazing forever, but me, if you come down to it, that's what I have to do to get that small capital to start. What I have to, man, I'm gonna do it. So do what you have to do to get that small capital that you need to start. Whatever you want to do, let's start the smallest way possible. You could look at a lot of companies in Ghana here. Hotovine the lady started from a small his house. Then he got back from there because his recipe was good. As long as you have good time, it's all you need.
Speaker 2:Wow. We've just been speaking to Rush Asare, and this is a man of many businesses, you know, and I've learned a lot from him, from just sitting down here with him for about 45 minutes to an hour. He's been awesome. Now, if you've been listening to this conversation, I'm sure you got some value out of it, and we are Connected Minds, so stay connected, derek Abaiti. I'm out.