Feeling The Fear And Doing It Anyway

Hi everybody. Today we're talking about feeling the fear and doing it anyway. So you're listening to the Boostly podcast and if this is your first time listening, this is the podcast that gives hosts the tools, the tactics, the trainings, and most importantly, the confidence to go out there and get more direct bookings. And confidence is something that we're talking about. Today we do a mini series on the Boostly podcast which talks to a short term rental host, somebody who has started their journey, who's felt that fear and has got started and is now helping to motivate others to do the same. So this is the mini series where we dive behind the Host. And here today on behind the Host, we've got Jason rees. He's got 5.5 properties and we're going to share Wyeth 5.5 during the podcast and he's going to be sharing his tips on things that he's learned across his journey and how you can get started yourself. So, so let's dive into it. Rhys, welcome along.

Yeah, thanks Liam. I'm looking forward to the conversation.

So first of all, can you give yourself an introduction, let us know about your business and anything you'd like to share.

So I started hosting just a little over two years ago. I haven't hosted a single person prior to that. And going back to 2011, I started my career in medical device. And after about 11 year long and successful career there, I got restless. I saw the business there from multiple different angles and ultimately decided that along with some burnout, I decided now was the time to dive into the entrepreneurial journey that I've always kind of felt a pull to do. And Airbnb was kind of an intersection of a lot of different interests of mine. So I dove head first and bought my first property in October of 2020. And so that was during the pandemic. So I didn't let the, didn't let the pandemic shut me down and, and, you know, put out that fire. I've done that. I've let the fire go out too many times in the past and I haven't pursued some of the things that I wanted to do. But this time I was, I was pretty determined not to, not to let that happen again.

So what was your fears before having your first short term rental? What were some of the things you worried about and how did you overcome those, those fears, those challenges?

My career was very rewarding in a lot of aspects and I was, I felt extremely rewarded. Sorry. I felt extremely fortunate to have found that line of work. It was rewarding both personally but also financially. At the end of the day, for the work that we were doing, we were working with patients that had abnormal heart rhythms and we would build 3D maps of their heart during the procedure. I would copilot for the physician and together we would go in to fix that patient. And oftentimes we fix their heartbeat within a split second of finding the right location. And a lot of that had to do with the insight and navigation that I was providing or eventually my team was providing. It's a very rewarding role. And as I climbed the ladder through that company, I found myself learning a lot about the business from all aspects. But the further I got away from that reward, the patient reward, I would say, the less fulfilling it became. And eventually I worked my way into the corporate office out on the west coast and I managed our 3D mapping software portfolio for the United States and led some of our key programs and initiatives. And again, very rewarding because it was complex, it was fast moving, etc. But at the end of the day, it burned me out. And so the discomfort that I faced was leaving a career that I had built that I absolutely love. I work for Johnson and Johnson for almost 11 years. I built a reputation, I built a network. All things that I was proud of, but I didn't feel, didn't feel fulfilled at the time. I no longer felt how I did earlier in my career. And from that position in corporate, I didn't see anything that appealed to me within the organization any longer or even within an employed setting of any sort. So it was extremely uncomfortable to leave behind or the idea of even leaving behind a career that so many people would be thankful to have and should be thankful to have. It's a great place to be. But for me, there was a feeling of being called to answer that entrepreneurial knock, if you will, at a time where it made sense to me, you know, the burnout was real. You know, I experienced physical symptoms in the office where I had to go to the doctor, the on site doctor in chest pain, stress, high blood pressure, all things that were very foreign to me as someone who was known to be extremely hard working and committed. So once it got to that point, for me it was, it was eye opening.

What has been some of the wow moments since you've started this journey? Because obviously your first one, feeling the fear and then doing it anyway, and then obviously you've added to that. What's been some of the wow moments along the way?

I think the first wow moment is when you get your first property and the bookings start to roll in and then the reviews start to follow and you're like, wow, I can actually do this. I'm actually, I'm one of the people that I've been studying and researching for so long. Like, wow, it's really not that hard. I think we tend to build things up to be quite a bit more intimidating and daunting than oftentimes they are. But more recently I would say that when I crunch the numbers on how many people I'll host this year, based off my projections, it's going to be over 3,000 people. And going from 0 people to 3,000 people in roughly two years time frame is very eye opening to me and I've reflected on that several times and it just the speed at which that came and I got to this point where I've been interviewed now a couple times on podcasts and I'm looked to for a lot of different direction from others online and my network and people find me through social. It's like, so I've gone from a medical device expert and resource in that field to within two years building a portfolio, a business and starting to build a reputation. So when I look back at all of that, it's all kind of oh, wow.

Thank you Jason for spending your time with us today. And yeah, thank you again for the boost, Lee listeners. We'll see you on the next one. Bye for now.

Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee like Bruce Lee. Cause it's so hard and the tea is loose leaf Making up those rhymes don't write it, just do it Loose.