About the Founder
For owners who care who is behind the work.
I’m Jake Lee, founder of Palisade Stays.
I grew up in Bergen County and built Palisade Stays for owners who want calm judgment, clean launches, disciplined execution, and serious stewardship of the asset from day one.
Over the last six years, I’ve operated 202 short-term rentals and facilitated more than 15,200 reservations. Those years and the hard-won lessons inside them taught me how to see the whole picture: where properties get exposed, where systems break under pressure, where guest experience slips, and what it takes to run this work properly.
OPERATING RECORD
The record behind the work.
These are the direct operating reps behind Palisade Stays: real launches, real reservations, and real assets under stewardship across multiple markets and asset types.
0
STRs operated
0
Listings launched
0+
Reservations facilitated
0
STR businesses built + scaled
$0M
Real estate stewarded
For the right owner, the point is simple: the judgment behind this company has been earned in the field.
WHAT REAL OPERATING EXPERIENCE CHANGES
What real operating experience changes
Jake's background is not just a credibility detail. It shapes how decisions get made, how problems get handled, and how standards hold when the work gets messy.
Real reps
He has seen what happens when a property is launched too early, positioned poorly, or handed off without the systems and standards needed to hold up under real use.
Calm judgment under pressure
Problems do not arrive on schedule in this business. Clear thinking under pressure is not a bonus. It is part of the operating standard.
Standards that hold
Readiness, consistency, accountability, and guest experience are not treated as extras. They are part of what protects both the stay and the asset.
Strategic and operational range
He sees both the higher-level business logic and the day-to-day friction that determines whether a property actually performs over time.
Local roots, broader depth
He grew up in Bergen County and brings operating experience shaped across multiple markets, asset types, and launch conditions.
Launch quality first
He knows that weak launches create downstream problems that are expensive to unwind later. Sequence, readiness, and timing matter from the start.
FROM THE FOUNDER
Why I built Palisade Stays
Before hospitality, I spent six seasons as a federal wildland firefighter on high-performing crews in the West. That work taught me team-first discipline, calm under pressure, and how much leadership matters when timing is tight and the stakes are real.
I learned this business under mentors who held a high bar for hospitality, stewardship, and follow-through. They taught me to pay attention to how a home feels, how a guest is treated, and whether the systems behind the work actually hold up as complexity grows.
Over the last six and a half years, I’ve relentlessly refined that craft by operating short-term rentals across Colorado, Vermont, South Carolina, Florida, New Jersey, and New York.
Over time, that experience taught me to see the whole picture more clearly: not just what helps a property perform well, but what protects the asset, mitigates risk, and ensures that the guest experience is thoughtful, consistent, and genuinely cared for.
What matters to me is helping a home perform well without losing what makes it worth caring about in the first place, while making sure the standards and systems behind it hold up, guests feel honored, and the people trusting us with it feel their trust was well placed.
After becoming a father, it felt right to bring that experience back to the region where I grew up and build something more selective, more personal, and more grounded. I built Palisade Stays for owners who want judgment worth trusting, intelligent stewardship, and a home that is looked after intentionally from the start.
Jake
NEXT STEP
Start the conversation with Jake
If you own a property in Northern New Jersey and want a clear read on whether it is actually a fit for launch, advisory, or full-service management, start here. The assessment is not meant to drop you into a generic sales sequence. It is how Jake gets the context he needs to give you a direct, honest read on the property, the opportunity, and whether this is actually a wise next step. If it is a fit, you will know what the path looks like. If it is not, you are better off hearing that early.