The Real Estate Professionals Association( GREPA) has entered into fresh partnership with the University of Environment and Sustainable Development to train students in the real estate development space.
The partnership will see members of the profession with practical skills deployed to teach in the university’s newly established department known as the “Department of Built Environment”.
The Memorandum of Undertanding ( MOU) formed part of a 3- days conference dubbed “Africa Real Estate Conference and Expo ( ARCE)” held at the University of Professional Studies.
The theme for the conference ” Ideas into Action – Proptech and Fintech” is to expose industry players to the world of emerging trends and technology and to help them scale up their businesses.
Founder and Chief Executive Officer of GREPA, Vicky Sampa described the event as momentous once since it brings all practitioners under one umbrella to learn for a common goal.
This is the sixth in a series of MOU signed by GREPA with academia.
” GREPA has been signing MOUs since 2016.
We have about six MOUs signed already.
Last year we signed three: One was with the University of Development Studies;
There was another one we signed with the Sunyani Technical University;
We also signed an international one with the Association of Estate Agents from Nigeria.
Today we signed one with the University of Environment and sustainable Development and so many.
And it’s really a very important one to us because for the past three years we’ve been talking about ‘Proptech’ , sustainability and ‘Fintech’ as well and so sustainability has been something that we’re very passionate about and we really want to support the initiative of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) so this partnership that we have with the University is a very important one for us”. She stressed.
Dr Dominic Boyetey, Acting Head of Department of the University of Environment and Sustainable Development who signed on behalf of the institution notes” So in this MOU, we’re looking at getting the experts from GREPA visiting the lecture halls and introducing our students to the practical aspects of real estate development and management and also we will be having common conferences together to share knowledge and to share what pertains in the field. It’s a great relief for us and we commend GREPA for the initiative”.
On his part, the key note speaker for the opening event, Dr. Ing. Stephen Debrah Ablormeti, the CEO of Gold Developers Ltd. introduced the practitioners to property and sales management and how to ensure transparency in the process.
He also introduced them to several applications and tools that would help startups scale up their business and stay in competition.
According to him the dynamics show that ” Your building must be tech-ready. As developers we make sure products are available on the shelves and sign up to systems like automation and how the building interacts with people. You want to get home and your curtains and lights welcome you and gates open automatically.
In the event that an intruder gets into your house the system will alert you. And so information technology is next driver in the real estate market”. He opined.
The three days event will witness several other top personalities sharing their experiences to help the industry.