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One Woman’s Vision in Turning Career Highs and Lows Into a New Kind of Leadership
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Global Banking and Finance Review
Company
By Aubrey Fox
Sheelam Chadha, 43, has never been one to follow a conventional path. After twenty years climbing the ranks of European real estate finance, a world often dominated by established networks and familiar faces, she chose a different route: ownership. Launching her firm, Dry Capital, on International Women’s Day 2025 was a decisive move that captured her philosophy of leadership, resilience, and action.
Chadha’s journey reflects the shifting landscape of entrepreneurship, where experience and instinct matter as much as vision. In a field where women remain vastly underrepresented at the ownership level, she decided to take the risk rather than spend her life regretting it. Her story is not about overcoming barriers for the sake of it, but rather about reimagining the very framework of opportunity itself.
With a career shaped by crisis management, cross-border investing, and relationship building in complex markets, Chadha embodies a generation of leaders who are reshaping real estate and finance on their terms. In this interview, she speaks candidly about what it means to build credibility, navigate bias, and lead without waiting for permission, offering a powerful reminder that leadership is less about fitting into old models and more about having the courage to create new ones.
Q: You launched Dry Capital on International Women’s Day 2025, noting it was time to "build something of my own." What specific experiences throughout your 20-year real estate investment career prepared you for this entrepreneurial leap, and why was now the right moment?
Sheelam Chadha: After two decades in the trenches, navigating everything from development finance to strategic advisory across European cross-border platforms, I reached a point where I knew I had more to offer than what large corporate roles allowed. I’ve liquidated deals through crises, built investor relationships from scratch, and led cross-border projects under pressure. These layers of experience gave me the confidence and the clarity to go out on my own but with a strong partnership network. Launching Dry Capital on International Women’s Day was a reclaiming of power, purpose, and timing.
Q: You’ve accumulated significant experience before founding Dry Capital. How has your previous leadership experience shaped your vision for this new venture, and what lessons didn’t you expect to bring forward?
Sheelam Chadha: Leadership in real estate and project sourcing has taught me that real influence is about building trust, staying resilient, and understanding timing. What I didn’t expect was just how much emotional intelligence and intuition would come to shape my strategy. You learn more from crises, political shifts, and complex internal dynamics than from any booming market. I’ve always been hands-on, an operator and a deal sourcer who goes deep into the market to find the right opportunities. It takes navigation, patience, and a thick skin. After years of doing that across cycles, I knew I was ready to do it on my terms with Dry Capital because I have a vision and am staying close to the demand.
Q: You've mentioned meeting with key partners and investors in your first month. What has surprised you most about investor appetite for your services, and how has being a woman founder influenced these early business conversations?
Sheelam Chadha: There’s a sharper awareness now of just how prolonged market volatility might be, between tariff escalations, fragmented capital flows, and stock market swings, traditional investment strategies are under pressure. What’s been encouraging is the recognition that secondaries and recap equity are becoming essential for navigating this new cycle and there is a huge pipeline of deals to be closed.
Q: Your career spans the financial crisis, Brexit, the pandemic, and now this new economic chapter. How have these cycles informed your approach to risk and opportunity, and how does Dry Capital's strategy reflect these lessons?
Sheelam Chadha: Each cycle has shaped me differently. The financial crisis taught humility, Brexit sharpened my political radar, the pandemic reinforced the need for agility, and the recent wars reminded me just how volatile and interconnected everything is. We’re in a decade some might call almost “lost,” yet it’s also one of reinvention. At Dry Capital, our strategy is grounded in adaptability. Everything has changed so fast. Covid, remote work, and AI are structural shifts that will reshape future office demand. Offices, for example, will rationalise and companies use technology and reduce personnel” Chadha said.
Real estate, ironically, moves slower than the cycles it's meant to serve. In ten years, we’ve seen retail fall out of favor, then offices, and now it’s sheds and beds; hospitality is suddenly hot again. Yet it still takes 3–5 years to plan and build anything. We need to find better ways to de-risk and speed up the process, because the future of real estate cannot continue to be shaped by crises and trends that outpace the very product we are trying to deliver.
Q: As a woman establishing a firm in an industry still dominated by men, what specific challenges have you faced and what advice would you give to other women considering entrepreneurship in finance or real estate?
Sheelam Chadha: The lack of women in front-office roles isn’t surprising and it is persistent. I’ve often been the one leading deals or representing teams, but that’s still not the norm. Some firms are genuinely trying to improve representation, while others haven’t moved past surface-level commitments. You deal with microaggressions and credibility checks, the kind that are widely felt. Over time, you learn how to manage them. Sometimes you address them head-on, sometimes you just keep moving. My advice to women: you don’t need permission to lead.
Q: Looking ahead, what does success look like for Dry Capital over the next five years, and how do you hope your leadership approach might influence the broader industry beyond just financial performance?
Sheelam Chadha: Success for Dry Capital is about becoming a trusted partner for investors navigating recap and corporate transactions across Europe. I want us to lead with integrity, intelligence, and an efficient team. Along the way, if we can create space for others, which we will, especially women, young professionals, and underrepresented voices, to step into leadership, I’m not where I am because I’m a woman; it just so happens that I am. I hope normalising leadership roles without labels is part of the legacy the next generation builds. I want a world where my son isn’t sidelined for being a boy, and my daughter doesn’t have to raise her voice just to be heard. True equity is about creating space for everyone to lead, speak, and belong.
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