Aden Jama is the President of Central Ohio Auto Sales. He was born in Somalia and moved to the United States of America in 1988. He shuttled, lived, and worked in New Jersey and New York till 2005 when he relocated to Columbus, Ohio. He told TheNewAmericans that “Columbus is a nice city and the opportunities are here.”
Central Auto Sales
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| Aden Jama |
We started in 2012. I started with auto repair shop in 2005. I wanted a business that will have to do with automobile industry. So I went to school for it. I was living in New York but it was an expensive place. One needs a lot of money to do business there. But I had a friend who was into auto sales and also had a repair shop in Columbus, Ohio. I moved to Columbus 11years ago and started with the auto repair shop. I started repairing cars. I switched to selling cars five years ago.
Advantage
The advantage I have is that I have the knowledge of cars. I know about different parts of the cars. I don’t just buy cars to sell cars, I buy cars to sell so that my customers will be happy, I will be happy and everybody will be happy. So I have great relationship with our customers. We sell to our customers through whatever form they can pay. We do a little bit of ‘buy here, pay here, and we do ‘in-house’, we do ‘outside vendors’ and we do ‘cash’.
Source
We source for vehicles online, we attend auction sales, there are two big auction sales in Columbus.
The advice I have for others is that a person must do his homework and study the market. I learned the hard way, which is an experience. I used to be very excited buying cars. It is a challenge if you are not able to sell the car.
Forecast
I look forward to being twice as big in five years’ time. I hope to have up to 10 employees. Right now, I work six days and almost 12 to 13 hours. I don’t think that there is any country out there that is like America especially for an immigrant. The opportunities are here. We just have to find our dreams and destiny if we work hard and do honest job. I’ll say God bless America. /TNA
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