With a stellar reputation in commercial and small-business banking, Jay Nash shifted into broking, where he’s quickly making a name for himself. The Shepparton-based broker reflects on his early successes, mistakes, and what it takes to build a regional powerhouse
Q. You started in accounting and then moved into banking before becoming a broker. Why and how did you become a broker?
I’d had a good banking career, always hitting targets. But I’d always wanted to be a business owner. I’d approached a few different brokers around the area just to see how that would look, whether it be buy-in or join as a broker with some sort of shareholding. While there were a couple of offers there, a few things didn’t sit too well with me.
I decided if I’m going to do it, I’m going all in on my own, starting at zero, and I just went for it. It was obviously a bigger risk. You have to learn every step of the way taking that path and be aware that it is a big piece of work in that first year. But I’m glad it’s the path I went down.
Q. What loans are you writing at the moment?
At the moment, it’s about 75 per cent residential.
Property has always been something that I’ve been interested in. I’m really enjoying that space, whether it’s helping first home buyers, all the way to reverse mortgages and bridging.
It’s been really rewarding, especially first home buyers. I think back to when I bought my first house. There’s a lot of advice I didn’t have. Being in their corner has been very rewarding.
So, I’m enjoying the resi space but still keeping that focus on commercial – that’s about 20 per cent of what I do as well. And asset finance sits at about 5 per cent.
Q. What’s your approach to generating brand awareness through social media?
Seeing the type of content being put out, I wasn’t seeing too many people in regional Victoria doing the same thing. At the time, I was trying to post two, three times a week. Towards Christmas last year, I decided I was really going to ramp that up and try to post daily.
There are times where you really don’t know what you should be posting. So, I always just go back to the discussions I had with clients during the day, what questions people are asking me at meetings, and really just trying to put some valuable content out there.
Q. Did anything surprise you about the broking industry?
I think just the level of support. There are so many people willing to give their time, and that includes other brokers, BDMs, and people within your aggregator. If you call someone, they tend to be happy to tell you almost everything they know about what they do.
Q. What advice would you give to someone starting out?
Don’t be afraid to ask for help. I spent days on deals that I probably could have figured out if I wasn’t afraid to call someone. There is so much support out there.
If you’ve got a scenario you’re unsure of, jump on the phone to someone. People are more than happy to help.
Tune in to hear more!
You can find out more about Jay Nash in the New Broker podcast. Tune in to the podcast, ‘How a regional broker wrote 150 loans in his first year’, here, or watch the full interview below:
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