...As the real estate, and property Development firm celebrates 9 Years of Existence
Little drops of water indeed make an ocean, so the case of Ibrahim Abiodun Consulting. In an exclusive interview with the CEO, he disclosed his readiness to take the business to a global brand.
Ibrahim Abiodun Consulting firm is located on floor 9, at the OPIC tower in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, with a strong relationship and connection, the major focus is to always deliver any transaction successfully, with high leave of integrity.
In the last 9 years, IBACON has touched lives positively, both in the training of students and volunteer donations to society, which gave birth to his Foundation, Ibrahim Abiodun Foundation (IBA Foundation) with a focus on helping the less privileged in society.
Q:Can we meet you?
My name is Ibrahim Abiodun Jinadu the principal partner of Ibrahim Abiodun Conluting, the journey started when I was with my Dad because my Dad was a developer then, I used to help him read Land agreement, and sign some documents, but I didn't develop any interest in the field then.
After my SSCE I had the privilege to work with CCECC in Ibadan so I was in the survey and design department then, we did the project for about one year, and thereafter I proceeded to Abeokuta working with Amazon property in Abiola way and I was part of the team that builds a feeling station at Asero.
Q: What inspired you to venture into the real estate and developer business?
I was inspired by some of the Engineers that we worked together, some of my bosses then used to advise me to go fully into real estate and development. Something similar inspired me when I saw a Castle magazine where an advert for Land that cost about 250million in Banana Island. Then I asked some of my bosses what someone study to get into the field and what is the reward if someone could sell such land, I was told that it was estate management. Then I went back to rewrite my SSCE in science because I wasn't a science student during my secondary school days.
The journey started in Moshood Abiola Polytechnic to study Estate Management and I went fully into that because I want to be a professional in that field.
Q: What was your first transaction in the business?
From my 100 level, maybe because of the little knowledge that I had before I entered the school, from my 100 level, l sold one plot of land at Elega around Okerama at Bode-olude side, that was my first transaction in the land.
Though I was doing all those renting and letting apartments to people, shops, and houses, my first transaction in the land that I was the one that led the team, and executed the transaction successfully was the land at Okerama side Elega, after the conclusion of that deal, I now said okay I think this is my real calling so I started moving.
Thereafter I proceeded for my Industrial Training ( IT), during my IT I met a lot of people and I discovered that it would be better for me to just learn about this job so I started another professional course then, they called IPMP also gave me an opportunity of meeting people, having the privilege to work with Consultant to Lagos government.
I did some projects on the same Banana Island where I saw an advert for Land in a magazine worth 250million, let me say after five years I was privileged to supervise some projects there, I did some projects in Sangotedo,Yaba, Lekki, and all sorts of things like that.
Q: How did IBACON come into existence?
During my HND I had already prepared my mind, that after school I would establish my firm, so after school let me just say the journey now started fully I now established Ibrahim Abiodun Consulting, so before that time, we had done many projects with no specific name, even though when we name it, we have not registered it yet, little by little we registered it so after then we established our office firstly at Quarry road, so little by little we extend to Okelewo in Abeokuta so we started the movement little by little, now we are at OPIC tower.
Q: What are your challenges in the business?
We have been facing a lot of challenges during that time of growth, but to God be the glory, the first challenges I can just say in this job are mainly some partners and the Associates or let me just say those unqualified that don't know the rules and regulations of the job, or in our industry.
So many people just see this profession as buying and selling in Real Estate is beyond that, it requires a lot of learning, it requires a lot of training, it requires a lot of preparation and majorly there must be high integrity in any deal, so the majority of people that are doing it they don't have integrity and they just maybe because of the situation we just met ourselves in this country. Anybody can just come out with one name and take it to the CAC and register their name and they will be starting the job which I believe our government can try to regulate all those things.
It will be much better because dealing with Real Estate people entrust their money in us, so and once people entrust their money to us there must be a lot of integrity in the transaction, It's a big challenge dealing with some of the agents most especially in this Abeokuta which I've tried to talk to some of them, liberate them and give them the advice on how they can go about this deal but it's not an easy thing.
After that, dealing with "Omo Onile" is one of the big challenges as well because in our way of dealings, there are some "Omo Onile" who will give us the land for us to go and sell it, we do our marketing, we stake our integrity on it, but at the end of the deal it's not we that did the transaction as an agent that plays the role of an agent in that deal, that we will because when the prospective buyer just choose that you market this land to us and okay they are ready to deal, some of the Omo Onile after they sell the land to us some after six months or one year they might sell it to another person, it's not an easy task for us.
For instance, the land that we sold at Ijebu Ode or Sagamu or even here in Abeokuta that we sold for last year and they expect us to be on the site again so sometimes we might not know what is going on on the site but these people called "Omo Onile" after they just see us that we've left the site they started doing some other things.
Some of our clients entrust their money to our hand, it is a big challenge if the government can aid us in that area then it will be much better in terms of dealing with land matters, so on the other things that I can say is the challenge well we have an economic challenge as well sometimes. Our dealings have to do with the economy, for instance, what's going on in the economy now a lot of construction projects are at the holding stage because the economy is not good, and people are fighting to survive that's part of the challenges that we have in this deal.
9 years of existence, what are the expectations during and after that people should be expected?
Thank you, we marked 9 years of existence, success, achievement, and greatness, as a firm yeah we are also developers, it would be major in our deals, we have done project development in Obada New City Estate, and right now we have a plan even though we are on it, there's a big project on the ground with us that we partner with Abeokuta North local government and Ogun state government as well, so we want to carry out a big project which is going to ease the housing deficit in the Ogun state.
We have discovered that there is a lot of housing deficit in Nigeria, and we want to contribute our quota to the development of Nigeria in terms of housing, right now our 100-acres Estate development is ongoing, we are still on documentation.
Our Happy Home estate project is coming to the limelight anytime soon, similarly, our site in Ibeju Lekki and our estate in Abuja are forose who want to key in now, that is what we have on ground, and hopefully in the next one year we are going to achieve a lot because we keep moving.
