The name Aare Oba Adetola EmmanuelKing certainly needs no introduction. This is because in the real estate sector today, Adron Homes & Properties are one of the leading heavyweights of that industry and he is the GMD/CEO of the company.
They are literally everywhere. Nearly every corner you turn to in major parts of Lagos, you are most likely to find one of Adron Home’s magnificent estates staring straight at you. Even their Adron Homes branded cars are all over the place. Like a comedian once joked, one could have thought the company had also turned “Uber” with the array of cars it has running the length and breadth of our roads. But what that tells you is that Aare Oba EmmanuelKing Adeola and his team are not resting on their oars in their bid and desire to completely take over the Real Estate industry in the country. Like his wife, Olori Aderonke, Aare is also an extremely stylish man. He is a tall, good looking gentleman and a power dresser. Whether it is native wears or suit, whatever the occasion is, Aare always turns out looking resplendent in whatever outfit he chooses to wear.
But beyond his penchant for looking good, the one thing about the warm and unassuming Aare is his tenacity and hunger for success. At the recent 5th City People Real Estate Awards where Adron Homes went away with The Most Dynamic Real Estate Company of the Year Award and Aare himself won the Most Creative Real Estate CEO of the Year Award, the GMD/CEO revealed how he bounced back from an incident that almost left him incapacitated for life. It took the grace of God, the support of his darling wife, Olori Aderonke and sheer grit and determination on his part to overcome the situation and bounce back big time. The very stylish and accomplished CEO who has virtually transformed Adron Homes into a multi-billion naira business empire revealed how he was incapacitated for about a year, several years ago, before he set up Adron Homes. He was shot in the leg during an armed robbery attack and the gunshot left him bedridden for months and totally incapacitated him to work for about a whole year. By the time he was strong enough to resume work, he was handed a letter from his former employers asking him to resign as the company didn’t think he was going to be any useful to them any longer considering he still had to manage his ailing leg. Naturally, like any other man, he was emotionally shattered.
It was like there was nothing meaningful he could make out of life. But his wife stood by him and urged him to stay strong. Hear him: “She was there for me. She stood by me and never let me down for one minute. And when I got a call from someone who thought I was still with my former employers requesting that I help him handle a property transaction worth 12 million naira, and I turned down the offer on the basis that I was no longer active in that line of business, it was my wife who insisted otherwise. She said I should call back the man and tell him I would handle the transaction, that I should not pass the opportunity to another person. And that was it. I took her advice and promptly called back the man. It was that deal that started what is known today as Adron Homes & Properties and I owe it all to my wife. She was the one who gave me the strength and the motivation I needed to get back on my feet again after that gunshot incident”.
At the 5th City People Real Estate Awards held recently at Times Square, Aare spoke to City People’s Senior Editor, WALE LAWAL (08037209290) and he opened up some more on the success story of Adron Homes & Properties.
You have just been recognized here today, sir, what does this award mean to you?
The award just goes to prove that the world is watching. The entire Nigerian community is watching us. We have shown consistency. We have shown tenacity. We were there at the very first City People Real Estate Awards, we were there at the second, the third, fourth and this fifth edition. And each edition, we were duly recognized for our efforts and contributions to the Real Estate industry. This is our 7th year in the business and it’s like we have not even started. The vision is getting bigger and bigger and bigger. There are times I go to some of our sites and I’m amazed at how far we’ve come. Even some of my close friends have come to me and said, ‘no, Tola, tell us, there’s somebody bankrolling this. There’s somebody behind all these.’ Some time ago, somebody told me he heard Tinubu just gave us 100 million naira. So, this award shows that we are making remarkable progress. Like I said earlier, from the first City People Real Estate Award to this 5th edition, we have been picking up awards, and not just any awards, but the biggest of the awards. So, this buttresses the fact that we’re progressing and Nigerians love what we’re doing.
You and Madam have consistently shown that you are two of the most humble entrepreneurs’ anyone can possibly come across in spite of your humongous accomplishments in the Real Estate sector. How have you been able to maintain your humility despite the successes you have recorded with Adron Homes?
When your aim is to serve, you will not let any kind of success distract you. Our aim is to serve Nigerians. Our aim is to contribute to the growth of the country, so I’ve always seen myself as a servant. There were several times I have had to prostrate to clients and went extra miles just to satisfy them. When some of our clients meet me onsite and my staff say that’s my boss, they say ‘that can’t be your boss oh’. That man carrying block and mingling with the builders?’ And when they approach me they say if I had never seen your picture or never met you before I would never have believed it is you. And oftentimes I just laugh and say I’m at your service. I am your humble servant. And to encapsulate all I have said, I think it’s also the knowledge of God in one’s life. I’m a Deacon, if not for my job I would’ve been a full-time pastor. So, I have an understanding of stewardship. I have an understanding of humility. By the grace of God, we constantly pray to God to give us the necessary wisdom to develop our lives.
Let’s talk about competition, sir. Are you ever under any sort of pressure to get above the competition, considering that new property companies keep emerging every day?
No, not at all. Instead, it has served as our driving force. Competition has been like an inspiration to us because if you’re not doing well, nobody will copy you, nobody will want to come to that same sector to do business. But because they’ve seen what we’re doing, new brands are coming on board and whenever they do so they have no other choice but to copy our strategies. That tells us clearly that we have been an inspiration to many. We are motivating them to do great things. I have met with several MD/CEOs of some of these new brands and what they tell me is that if not for you we would not venture into this sector. And another thing competition does is that it makes you stay on top of your game. At Adron Homes, we continue to reinvent, we are more creative. We spend more hours to think of new strategies and ensure we remain the trailblazers and the sector’s pacesetters.
Sir, what has success taught you, starting from the first day you started Adron Homes to this very moment that it has become a multi-million naira empire so to speak?
Very simple. Success has taught me about one thing and that’s service to humanity. Life has taught me to be genuine and sincere with what you’re doing. Once you do that, success will catapult. It will be on auto-drive and will roll over by itself. There are those whose success is only temporary. You hear about them today and tomorrow they have disappeared, you hear about them no more. They are completely out of business. But when the focal point is service and you’re here to serve, your success becomes unprecedented. So, what success has taught me is that you must remain a service-oriented company. Once you make it a point of duty to always give your clients excellent service, success will come.
In the next few years, what should we expect to see from Adron Homes, considering how much you have achieved in just seven years?
Well, in the next few years we’re going to do a whole lot. Like we started and changed the narrative because we are the game-changer. Now, I get a lot of my colleagues who tell me, ‘ah, you have taken over the industry because people now ask them, are you like Adron? Is your estate like Adron? Does it have good houses? Does it have good roads, good infrastructures, beautiful children playing ground? Now, we want to penetrate further into all states of the federation, make every household a property owner and increase the quality of our service delivery, that is what we are set to do.
Finally, sir, it’s no longer a secret that your wife has played a major role in the success story of Adron Homes, tell us, what is it about this wonderful woman sitting right beside you that you love the most?
She’s a woman of virtue. She’s a very quality woman. A rare kind of woman. I want to say that I am indeed privileged to be her husband. She has been very supportive and I will forever remain grateful to her.
