Antoinette, who is an accountant by trade, has been running the channel with her husband. A year into their content-creating career, Oguntonade was scouted by Channel 4 to present The Great House Giveaway.
The programme, which won a Bafta for best daytime programme in 2021, sees members of the public tasked with flipping a property from auction. Any profit they make, they get to keep.
“Off the back of our social media content, I became a full-time TV presenter,” Oguntonade explained. He has also worked with non-profit brands more recently to help consumers save on their energy bills.
“Now it’s all coming full circle,” said Oguntonade. “I’m going back and creating my own advisory firm. It will implement all the values we’ve learnt through our success in the social media space, which has seen us help so many people.”
‘Social media puts you in the shop window’
His soon-to-be business partner, Asuquo, is a financial adviser who also hosts Money on my Mind - a digital series launched by Channel 4 and Barclays which takes a look at "real people's relationship with money". The two have been friends since they were children.
Oguntonade grew up in southeast London, and Asuquo in east London. At the age of 22, Oguntonade bought his first house in Sittingbourne, on the outskirts of London.
He became a mortgage broker shortly afterwards. “All of a sudden, I had familiarity and proximity to the housing market, something daunting suddenly became my everyday.”
Now returning to his roots, Tayo said “it’s scary” much of the mortgage brokerage industry still isn’t changing.
Emmanuel Asuquo on mini-series Money on my Mind
“We’re even seeing changes in behaviour of older generations,” he explained.
“Social media puts you in the shop window. You get to showcase your ability to teach and achieve results. It does build trust.
“Both myself and Emmanuel have had incredible opportunities through social media. That can be helping a teacher who hasn’t been able to get a mortgage for years and turning that around, to a football player who has just signed for a new club and they want it broken down to them how they can buy their first home.
“The teaching element is going to be the backbone of the whole firm.”
More recently, Oguntonade has been producing longer videos in Stratford interviewing young people to test their maths, geography and literacy skills.
“Once upon a time, I could have gone to Stratford with an iPhone. Now I hire a team, a sound person, a videographer and an editor. These things have changed so much.”
A brokerage which truly represents its clientele
Oguntonade is also hoping this new brokerage will allow him and Asuquo to work with under-represented groups.
