Real Estate Investor Magazine South Africa April 2018 - 100th Issue! | Página 13

BRONWYN CORBETT
Bronwyn Corbett Shares Her Insights
KEY STATS
Age: 37
Current position: Co-founder and CEO of Grit Real
Estate Income Group
Family: Married to Murray Corbett with two
beautiful girls
Books currently reading: Other people’s money
- John Kay
Life motto: “Never say die!” Being resilient is
crucial in the property industry: it is not a place for
those who are easily discouraged.
B
ronwyn Corbett, the woman behind Grit Real Estate
Income Group, seems to be the living embodiment of
her company’s name. “To have grit is to move to action,
to animate, to drive, and to energise,” she says of her favour-
ite quote. And this, we have come to see, is exactly what the
Co-founder and Chief Executive has.
Born and raised in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, Cor-
bett explains: “Growing up, the opportunity to obtain a de-
gree or tertiary qualification was never a foregone conclusion,
and I worked full time, studying via correspondence to pay
my way through university.” It is this that inspires her belief
that, through hard work and persistence, you can make your
own breaks.
“My formative years taught me you can either be a victim of
circumstances or work exceptionally hard to pursue every pos-
sible avenue that will allow you to reach your objectives,” she
says. She worked hard at maintaining good grades at school
and was lucky to be introduced to accounting firm BDO
straight after school, where she completed articles whilst
studying and paying off her student loan.
Strong and determined women inspired Corbett from a
young age: “My mother may not have had the same oppor-
tunities in education as I had, but she worked exceptionally
hard. My work ethic and drive are largely because of her exam-
ple and the fact that she never accepted complacency from me.”
Pushing her from a young age, Corbett’s mother showed her
that she could do better by challenging the boundaries of what
she thought possible. “Today, I know that this can be a dou-
bled-edged sword as I keep on pushing myself. I am much more
relaxed when it comes to my own daughters though,” she adds.
As one of the few women in an executive position in prop-
erty, Corbett is acutely aware of what needs to be done to bring
about change. “If we can increase the opportunities for women
in the workplace, if we achieve equal opportunities, the world
will be the better for it,” she says. A strong proponent for female
empowerment, Corbett actively supports several mentorship
and education programmes.
Getting into property
Obtaining a BCompt degree majoring in tax, auditing and ac-
counting, Corbett enrolled for an honours degree at the Uni-
versity of Durban. She completed the Chartered Accountant
(CA) SA board exam with a first-time pass
But her move to property was entirely coincidental. “After
qualifying as a CA(SA) at BDO, I was appointed as an Audit
Manager at Lucro Auditing. It was during this time that I
started working on an intensive audi t spanning 20 years of op-
eration of a property developer, providing me with an intimate
knowledge of the commercial property sector business. I sat in
a basement for two years reconstructing all the records and fell
in love with property then,” Corbett explains.
This lead to her joining Universal Property Professionals,
where her position included asset and development manage-
ment. “This further sparked a passion for the operational side
of the business, backed up by a solid financial background,”
she says.
After joining Motseng Investment Holdings as Chief Fi-
nancial Officer, Corbett could apply her in-depth knowledge
of the property sector with her experience in optimal funding
strategies and her deal-making abilities.
This eventually resulted in the listing of Delta Property
Fund, the JSE’s largest landlord to national government, in
November 2012. During her time at Delta Property Fund,
Corbett held the dual role of Chief Financial Officer and
Chief Operating Officer. She was responsible for the com-
pany’s funding strategies, including establishment of a ZAR2
billion Domestic Medium-Term Note Programme (DMTN)
and led the team responsible for obtaining a national scale is-
suer rating from Global Credit Ratings on the DMTN pro-
gramme.
Since listing in 2012, Corbett was part of the executive who
grew the fund from R2.2 billion to R11.8 billion in 2014, when
she took up a non-executive position . “I wanted to focus on
my role as Chief Executive of Delta International, a company
I co-founded with Sandile Nomvete which later rebranded to
Grit Real Estate Income Group,” she explains.
At Grit Real Estate Income Group Bronwyn played a sig-
nificant role in listing and converting the group to its current
pan-African focus, underpinned by US dollar-based leases.
This was followed by a merger with the rest of Africa op-
erations of JSE-listed The Pivotal Group to form Mara Delta,
significantly expanding the company’s footprint and portfolio.
In mid-2017, Bronwyn headed the team responsible for
raising US$121.2 million in fresh equity, one of the largest real
estate equity raises on the continent to date.
This not only introduced new strategic investors into the
Group, but significantly diversified its portfolio across asset
classes, growing the portfolio from 2 assets and 2 countries
in 2015 (valued at US$140 million) to 20 income producing
assets in 6 countries (valued at US$583.5 million) (excluding
listed investments) as at 31 December 2017.
“We road-showed Grit’s investment case literally all over
SA Real Estate Investor Magazine APRIL/MAY 2018
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