Why did the eauropian countries explore and colonize the americas?

There were four key European countries that colonized NorthAmerica. ... Spain colonized Americabecause they were searching for gold and silver. They did find a lot of gold and silver when they conquered the Aztec and Inca Empires. Francecolonized North America because of the great amount of furs they found there.

Well, some of these areas were found accidentally. European rulers would hire explorers to find different sea routes to other parts of the world. As in the case of Christopher Columbus, he thought he was in Asia but didn't realize he had discovered the Americas. So they found these areas and realized that they had valuable resources and people that could be enslaved to work for them. These countries were also in search of certain valuables.