Fidelity Bank’s entrepreneurship project dubbed the ‘Fidelity Young Entrepreneurship Initiative’ has featured one of its beneficiaries who is breaking grounds and making remarkable progress in the Real Estate Sector.
He is in the person of Mr. Justice Offei Jnr., the Chief Executive Officer of indigenous Ghanaian company SIKADAN Homes, a real estate company.
We bring to readers excerpts of the interview:
Tell us who you are?
Justice is the founder and managing director of Sikadan Homes. He is an award-winning and Tony Elumelu Entrepreneur who studied Petroleum Engineering from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana. He is currently pursuing a blended Master’s pathway at MIT in Economics, and Entrepreneurship at Harvard University.
What motivated you to start the business?
Problem-solving has always been a part of me since high school. I am moved, the majority of the time by endeavors that involve finding solutions to problems. With that in mind, entrepreneurship is the most effective tool for such a cause, in my opinion.
Sikadan Homes is a solution tailored to deliver affordable housing solutions in two ways; rentals and homeownership schemes for the low-income population in Ghana. According to a Housing Survey by GIZ, in 2018, only about 1% of the Ghanaian population were able to purchase the cheapest mortgage.
Kindly elaborate on some of your achievements?
In terms of recognition, Sikadan Homes has been nominated for Forty Under 40 Awards this year.
Any challenges/lessons learned?
Access to cheaper funds to support more paying clients. Access to finance within our sector is a challenge, making it difficult to grow the business. Thankfully, programs such as OCIF and Fidelity Youth Fund is here to help small businesses.
How has the funding received from the program helped your business?
I have been able to increase my production and market share by 40%
Advice to young upcoming entrepreneurs
Work hard because the future is bright
About Sikadan Homes
Our Solution
We are Ghana’s No 1 online marketplace that provide monthly rent payment option for renters in a more convenient and safer way; a new wave of social equity and an alternative to affordable housing for low-income households in Ghana.
We are a facility management firm that provide apartments that are insured against fire, theft , life and other Allied Perils.
Problem Scope
Access to decent and adequate housing is often considered as a basic human right. The World Bank Group estimates that by 2030, three billion people, or 40 percent of the world’s population will need new housing units.
When the annual carrying cost of a home exceeds thirty percent (30%) of household income, then it is considered unaffordable for that household. Low-income households face difficulties in accessing not only affordable housing solutions but also housing of good quality in Ghana. In Ghana both the informal and formal sector supply of housing continues to be inadequate to meet the increasing demand. Moreover, landlords do not accept monthly payment for rent and tenants have no option than to raise huge sums of money to settle 1-year or more rent advance.
Since 2010, Ghana has been tagged as experiencing a housing deficit of 1.7 million units. However, present trends show that the probable increase in deficit may not be because of an increase in population but due to the inability of citizens to afford houses.
According to iBAN Sector Study Reports in Ghana published in 2016 by GIZ, housing supply is dominated by informal sector operations and housing sold on the formal real estate market is beyond the financial means of most households, with only about 1% of households able to afford the cheapest houses offered by formal developers.
The 99% of the remaining households that can’t afford the cheapest houses offered, end up on the house rental market, creating a demand for an affordable accommodation. According to the same report, about 1.5 Million low-income households need affordable housing solution in Ghana with about 12.4 Million Ghanaians living in slums.
