Jay Standish

business
Companies I've Started:
-
Restaurant: The Flaming Eggplant Cafe
-
Coworking space: Impact Hub Seattle
-
Coliving real estate: OpenDoor Coliving
Areas of Focus
-
Product: Improvements / Customer Traction
-
Go-to-Market: Rollout / BizDev / Partnerships
-
Operations: Systems / Staffing / Workflows
In 2013 I co-founded OpenDoor Coliving - a pioneer in the concept of professionally-run community housing. Starting by leasing a single home, we grew OpenDoor to operate over 400 units across 3 states, eventually constructing new buildings designed for community living.
My business partner Ben Provan and I lived in our houses for the first 5 years of the company, embedding ourselves in the the daily practice of living in community. Although our real estate properties were successful investments, we closed the operating company in December 2022 after a 9 year run.

Consulting
I offer "co-founder as a service" to support on key projects that require someone with a range of skillsets and experience.
-
Concept + Program
-
Property diligence
-
Financial modeling
-
Project capitalization
-
Legal + compliance
-
Development + Construction
-
Asset Management
REal Estate
-
Customer Insights
-
Product Improvement
-
BizDev / B2B Sales
-
Enterprise Fundraising
-
New Market Rollout
-
Lean BizOps
-
General Management
Proptech
-
Real Asset Capitalization
-
Operations Design
-
Product Scaling
-
Multi-region Compliance
-
Automation & Efficiency
-
Hiring & Onboarding
-
Policies + Procedures
Climate tech

creativity
Visual Art
I have been producing works on canvas, improvising with various methods.
Flip through the gallery below:

leadership
Outdoor Experience
40-day canoe expedition in northern Quebec and Labrador.
Keewaydin Section B, 2002
Age: 17
Distance: ~500km
A cluster of forest fires in exery direction blocked all routes while in Quebec, forcing us to use our satellite phone to call in an exacuation via float planes to Labrador.
75-day expedition in Western Australia
National Outdoor Leadership School
Age: 20
Distance: ~800km
Travelled through the Kimberley region of north western Australia via canoe for 40 days, then backpacking without trails for 25 days, and 10 days on an island sharing stories with the local Bardi people.
40-day canoe expedition to Hudson's Bay
Keewaydin Section A, 2003
Age: 18
Distance: ~600km
Paddled from Reindeer Lake in Saskatchewan into Nunavut lake-hopping to the Thlewiaza river which led us to Hudson's Bay. Picked up by Inuit team; skiff over ocean waves to Arviat where we flew to Churchill for the train.
7-day solo backpacking in Utah Canyonlands
Self-planned
Age: 35
Distance: ~60km
Did a solo out-and-back during a heat wave. Didn't see another person the whole time. Grazed heat exhaustion twice.