About Us

ABOUT ME

Hello I’m andre major key

When I introduce myself, I say that my name is Andre Reid, that I am a tax professional and realtor; I’m also a husband, and a father. I usually say that I am an entrepreneur, steadily building myself an empire, one venture at a time. These are the facts of my life, though they hardly paint the picture of the journey I have taken to be here. Those facts convey a lot about me, but for you to understand how far I’ve come, I would need to take you back to the beginning.

The spirit of entrepreneurship was ignited in me in 2009 while I was attached to the Faculty of Education and Liberal Studies at University of Technology, Jamaica as a student, pursuing a Construction Technology in Education programme. Using money earmarked for tuition for my upcoming semester, I invested in opening a restaurant on the University’s Papine Campus, trying to build something sustainable out of nebulous ambition, and a desire to harness my potential.

My dreams of business ownership proved elusive, however, when I realized I was unable to get approval from the University’s Students’ Union Council for the restaurant’s location. At that point I felt like I was out of options, but having recently married, and needing a way to support myself and my partner, I found employment as a teacher at Holy Trinity High School.

Throughout 2009 I tried to balance a full time job with my tertiary education, and as very many before me have proven, that isn’t an easy task. Ultimately, I made the decision to seek more fertile ground overseas, to leave the comfort of my native island, immigrating to the United States. I enrolled initially at Florida International University, continuing to pursue a Construction Management programme, but I faced so many difficulties transferring credits from Jamaica that I eventually found an alternative in Broward College. Seeking a change of pace, I earned an Associate’s Degree in Arts in 2013 and a Bachelor of Science in Supervision and Management in 2016.

And those are facts as well; that I have an Associate’s Degree and Bachelor of Science Degree. But they are only a small representation of the investment I’ve made in my own growth, my businesses and my family. My resolve to learn and to realize my own most elusive dreams never wavered. During my time at Broward, I started at T.G.I. Fridays as a server in 2010. What began as a means to earn a living, turned into an opportunity for honing latent skills I hardly knew I had.

My can-do customer service attitude, and my interest in building brand loyalty and awareness, earned me a promotion to shift supervisor. It may be a cliché, but hard work does pay off, because my work ethic and commitment was recognized with a promotion to manager in training. Even though the position came with additional responsibilities, it also exposed me to management principles and sales and marketing trends. I’m a firm believer in learning as much as you can, in any position you are. At this time, even while training as a manager, I also served as a substitute teacher at Broward, and drove Lyft and Uber, finding as many paths as I could to generate capital to fund my life’s vision and take care of my family. And the urgency to establish my legacy was dialed up with the birth of my son Micah in 2014.

I’ve always described myself as a go-getter. But I’ve never been driven by blind ambition. So when the food truck I bought couldn’t get approval for licensing from the State of Florida to sell comestibles, and $12,000.00 in investment went up in smoke, I revamped and tried again. I opened a car wash shortly afterward, flexing my entrepreneurial muscles. It occurred to me shortly after that I wasn’t interested in something so labour intensive. And though the fallacy of sunken costs could have trapped me there, I sold my equipment and moved on.

I was always driven forward by the vision I had for myself; of being successful, but also being able to give something to others, through creating employment or sharing my knowledge in a positive way.

So I jumped at the chance in 2014 to work with a mentor, and to work as a sales representative and tax consultant at Otto Financial Solutions. I spent the next three years there, soaking up everything I could, eventually helping to move the company from 11 clients to over 200. I surpassed so many goals, and brought in over 20% more business. I established a social media marketing campaign that I taught to my team members. I was an indispensable part of a winning team, and I’m exceptionally proud of the time I spent here, being mentored and observing and helping to craft business best-practices in real time.

But as fulfilled as I was feeling, there was still a part of me that knew I needed to find my own way, make my own perch, as it were. And having to be in the office, learning from more experienced professionals and snagging walk-ins, made it difficult to find time to pursue other avenues. That’s when I decided to go back to my first love; real estate.
Permit me to go back a bit. In 2010, I had the choice to purchase a car, or a house. And for six months in that year, I endured the public transport system, and scrimped and saved every dollar I could, called in every favour I could, so that my wife and I could have our own home. That feeling of being able to have a place of my own was one of the best things I’ve ever experienced.

And finally, I found my purpose. I earned my real estate license in 2015, and now I provide the expertise to help my clients mend their credit and purchase their own properties, to help them feel what I felt when I closed the deal on my own home.

Currently I’m trying to move away from being in office; I’m training my staff to provide the professionalism and competence I do, helping to establish fulfilling, sustainable employment. I am using all I have learned, finding my footing in the dynamic world of real estate, and carving my niche in a career that brings me personal empowerment and allows me to provide my family with the life we’ve always envisioned. I don’t know if there will be a fork in the road ahead; if I will have to make decisions that will drastically change the landscape of my life, but I’m confident that everything I’ve learned now will be my rudder in any storm.