Opening Kenya’s real estate to the world

Woodhams grew up in Kenya. He actually came to Kenya in 1973 when he was only three. His father was an expat in Mombasa (lectured at the Mombasa Polytechnic for a number of years).

He started school in Kenya before moving to the UK. He came back to Kenya after university and after a while left to work for Knight Frank in Tanzania before coming back to Kenya in 2003 to run the Kenyan operation.

Recently, his company unveiled the inaugural edition of Africa View, a publication dedicated to showcasing some of the very best residential properties for sale in key destinations across Africa.

We met in his office for this interview, where from behind his desk, he sat on a big, colourful bouncy-looking plastic ball. (Good for the back, he said.)

-------------------------------------------------------

Have gated-communities become the biggest cliché of recent times?

The different sectors in the property market tend to come in and out of popularity fairly quickly. I think we might be approaching a point where prices may go down; they will still go up but slowly. People ask me if there is ever going to be a burst in the housing bubble and I think the easiest answer is that there won’t because we don’t have the ingredients for that to happen.

What’s the best possible advice you would give young people about property?

I think this constant sub-division of ancestral land is a bad idea. You don’t need to own a bit of farmland in mashambani. There is an expression I can’t quite remember now - but it’s along the lines that if all goes wrong, you can always go back to your shamba and eat the matoke that grows out of the ground.

That shouldn’t happen anymore; we should have farmers who stay on the land but when you come to the city, you don’t need that land anymore. Instead, own an apartment and participate in the economic growth in the city. If you are a tenant right now, this is literally slipping through your fingers, you aren’t participating. My advice, sell your plot of land upcountry and stop paying rent here.

Well, it’s not as easy as you make it, you realise?

I know, with the 16 per cent interest rates that banks charge, it’s not easy, but that would be the ideal.

Oh, and another thing I see that Kenyans should change is this thing of chasing academic qualifications. Work experience is equally important, I’m not interested in how many Masters degrees you have. I need to know what you have done in terms of practical experience.

You need a job – which just aren’t there - to get work experience, and to get a job, you need sound academic qualifications, you see the circle?

Well, you know, I think employers just have to ask the right questions. We have an internship programme for top students from the building economics departments of the universities coming here but they are very academic people and invariably end up in our research departments.

We can’t fill the company with just academic people. We need brokers and charismatic people who go to bars and break deals. We have a guy here, who enjoys rugby, likes his drink, has friends and he goes out there and seals deals all the time and this guy doesn’t have any qualifications to speak of. He doesn’t need them, and yet he’s very important to us. We need a mix of all these people.

How do you get loose?

I have a youngish family; my daughters are 14, 11 and 9 so I spend lots of time with them. I also have a dirt bike I like using, I’m also busy building a car for the Classic Safari rally in November next year, I have a bit of petrol running in my head.

What’s your relationship with cars?

I love cars. I bought my first one at 16, the only kid in school with a car, a nice Mini State. I drove the 1972 Series 3 Land Rover across the Sahara desert. I had just finished university in the UK, there were no jobs at that time so I figured it would be interesting to spice up my CV.

When I got back, a magazine wrote about it. I attached that in my CV and got a job in two weeks.

How was that experience?

It was four of us in the car, I was the only one who had real mechanics knowledge. The journey took three months through France, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Spain, France and back to the UK, all in a vehicle my father said he wouldn’t even drive to the local shops.

That Land Rover is only two years younger than I am. I have also been doing the Rhino Charge for 10 years now. I also built a car from scratch when I was 28. I now drive a Petrol VX; thankfully, the company now pays the fuel bills (Grins). I also have a motorbike, a dirt bike.

If we were to boil you in a large pot, what would we get? What’s your essence?

Petrol. (Laughs). Which is funny, because the French word for petrol is essence. Anyway, I’d like to think of myself as a family man but like all men, I think I’m a bit self-centred. I enjoy spending time with family. But yes, I’ve built this company up. They say that no one ever wishes they had spent more hours in the office on their deathbeds, at the end of day family is what counts.

Do you play golf?

No, I don’t actually, I find the game a bit slow but perhaps I really should if I need to mix with the big cheeses. Maybe I will.

How old are you now?

44

What’s the best thing about being 44?

I think you get more comfortable in your own skin the older you get. You are more sure of yourself.

What is your greatest insecurity, then?

It’s insecurity itself! (Laughs). I would like to sleep better here. I sleep better in the UK. That’s always at the back of my mind, I don’t like to have an askari at night outside my house or heavy bars on my windows and that’s a shame for this country.

You could say that’s easy for me to say seated in my ivory tower but you know the disparity of wealth in Nairobi is the same in New York but nobody needs to turn to crime. Kenyans are such lovely people, even cops stop you and they try to be serious but it’s just hard for them. (Sighs and pauses). That’s a difficult social economic question. But yeah, I think it’s a shame.

What’s on your Bucket List?

Yes, the Classic Safari Rally is definitely one of them. I like climbing mountains, I’ve done Kili’, Mt Elgon, Mt Meru…there is that sense of achievement…have you done any of that?

I did Mt Kenya. Never going back for all the money in the world.

(Laughs). It’s tough, isn’t it? But yes, so the Classic Safari Rally is one of them, the Dakar Rally would be my ultimate dream but it’s out of my reach.

I’d also like to jump out of an airplane in Diani, kite surf, of course. I’ve spent 35 years in East Africa yet I don’t think I’ve seen nearly half of it.

What are your greatest challenges raising girls, especially one getting into teenage?

Well, I haven’t quite gotten there yet; I just got my head in the sand. (Laughs).

Are you anxious?

Well, I know the kind of boy I was, so if they meet a boy like me, I would be very anxious. I was a typical mkora. (Laughs). But yes, it’s a concern. My oldest is in boarding school in the UK, hopefully that might help. (Pauses thoughtfully). Or it might just make it worse. Let’s wait and see.

Biggest regrets in life?

Wow, that’s a tough one. Uhm…not buying land when I got here. I wish I bought a beach property in 1993. I did my house in Karen in good time though. I sold some land too early, having money worries hang over you is very disruptive to family life.

Do you listen to the radio in your car?

I love 105.5 X-FM. They never play any song that irritates me. The deejays are a bit too crude, though, I don’t know why they have to be. I think it’s that sort of deejaying where you think you have to be crude, but it doesn’t bother me personally only when I have my kids in the car is it a problem - so I turn it off.