guru me wrote:@hamburglar- The reason we are not doing venture capital or angel investing is because it does not fit our risk profile. Start ups (esp in Africa) are hugely risky even if you diversify your risk based on industry. Not to say that they will not be attractive in the near future. I personally feel that China is increasingly becoming uncompetitive in as far as its key economic drivers (in my opinion) are concerned- cheap labour.
There are very few locales left and I believe Africa, if we can get our act together, is primed to fill this gap. Kenya (still my opinion) with its relative stability, advantageous geographical location (hub for most East and Central African countries) highly educated population and fairly decent English speakers stands a very good chance of benefiting from all the coming changes. I know for a fact that Chinese firms are seriously looking for partnerships in Africa. This is something I feel we should all look into as there will be a lot of cake to go around.
We are not looking at stock or debt markets as we feel we are adequately exposed to these. Yes we would consider leveraged buyouts as long as there is a demonstrable upside to the deal.
Basically what we are interested in is discounted assets (selling below their market values) that someone might have come across but lacked the financial capacity to pursue. It would help if they were more on the "sure deal" side of things rather than the "speculative" side of things.
Once we have a deal that we feel will work, we normally work on a % of profit that way we both have a vested interest in seeing the deal work. Structure of execution is mutually agreed on a case by case basis.
I realise that there are not too many such deals around hence our casting our nets far and wide- which pretty much explains this post.
@Guru me.... it think its only fair that you tell us who "we" really are? You sound like someone who can do business, but we also need to know we are dealing with the right people.... You might think this site doesn't have serious people but trust me, you've got great brains and serious members in here, but we have had several attempts to swindle us off some cash and may be that is why people are very skeptical about a new member who immediately sells of an idea and especially without providing enough info. If you are here to sell your business, there is nothing to hide, put the name of your business here, put the physical address so we can walk in when we need to.
From what you mention above, and to put it in a more "blunt" way, what you really are looking for is a say people who are going down with mortgages and are in the verge of foreclosures, or someone acting in the verge of desperation to sell off property? Am i right? If so, you have come in abit early... people are still in denial over the repayments and if it is still worth owning a house through mortgage... but your venture will pick if people don't re-evaluate their financial positions.