This is going to be a rather vague question and I apologize in advance.
I’m very casually considering putting an offer in on a fixer upper horse property for personal use only. It has an existing indoor and outdoor. The people selling it have zero experience with horses (it was inherited), nor does their realtor and my realtor and I believe it’s overpriced for the market.
The indoor is a mess. At the very least, it would need all new footing, but very likely it would need the base redone as well. It’s 120’ x 60’.
The outdoor appears to have been sand at one time, but is now very much overgrown with weeds. Don’t have exact measurements, but I would guess 100’ x 200’.
What I’m looking for is some negotiating power. I’d like to come to the table and be able to say “look, the arenas alone will need $xxx to redo the footing to even make them usable”. Recognizing that there are lots of options (sand, rubber, etc.) but that I’m not in a position to go get quotes or estimates, can someone help me with a very general number as far as what it would cost to get these arenas in working order? (Ie. Are we looking at $20K or $200K?) If it helps, the arenas would be used lightly for H/J, dressage and super cute leadline kids. We’re in the Great Lakes region.
Again, I apologize that this is a vague and potentially hard to answer question, but I have zero experience with footing and I’m trying to get some leverage and also an idea if this is too much of a fixer upper!
I think youre working to hard at worrying that the other side understands your math. What the property is worth given it’s pluses and minuses is entirely up to you. If they get their feelings hurt, or love you like a sister is irrelevant. No one else wants a fixer upper either, so I would discount it a lot more than the net cost of footing. I’d bet you there are scads of things that are in the same condition. As far as their asking price, again irrelevant in my mind. The market determines whether they are right or wrong over time.
A solid zero or few contingencies offer makes things happen a lot better than making a case for this or that discount…
The thing that will help you greatly in keeping costs down, is being able to spread the material yourself – so long as you have a decent sized tractor with a bucket, and are skilled at moving material around – back blading, leveling etc – and have a good harrow to finsh with. Hiring a guy with a machine to do this can run you upwards of 250.00 a day just for the machine. Then you’ll have to pay for his labor on top of that. Starts to add up!
That being said, I would go with a stone dust base. In my area stone dust runs about 36.00 a yard. If you measure your arena and determine the cubic yards you will need, then you’ll be able to figure out the cost pretty closely – for the material. Then there is the price for delivery on top of that. Call your local quarry/gravel seller and get prices.
Angular sand (to go on top) is cheaper than stone dust – runs about 1/2 the price in my area. Again, seek out a source for sand and give them a call.
If you want to go with a more expensice ‘topping’ – rubber mulch or any of the fiber footings, etc. all it takes is a call to any of these suppliers. All they need is your cubic yards (depending on depth you want) and they will be more than happy to give you a price including delivery. But with any of these types of footings you are looking at quite a lot of $$$ and some – if not all of them – need to be put down by a professional.
Straight angular or sub-angular sand is the cheapest.
#1 - You are starting this post with an apology, actually 2 apologies. This is not a good strategy or mental state to do “hard-ball” negotiating. In real-estate, as with horses, a property is worth what a buyer and seller agree upon.
You should think hard about what you’re willing to pay for this property. Think of your BATNA (Best alternative to a negotiated agreement) as part of your negotiating strategy. You can challenge the sellers and realtors. Based on your post you can easily state that they are not knowledgeable about how severely deteriorated the facility is. You need to put your used car salesman hat on…eg., you need to be comfortable with BS. https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/ba…-current-deal/
#2 - Why aren’t you in a “position to get quotes or estimates?” All you need to do is pick up the phone. Call around to a few excavators or stone companies and ask for “budget estimate” for the cost of materials delivered and spread. You can give them a couple of scenarios, from “Low” - eg., spread only some sand, to “High” eg., cost to excavate to a base, stone and top sand. Voila! you have a negotiating estimate.
#1- I apologized due to the vague nature of the question and my inability to provide thorough information. I was trying to recognize that people responding would want more information, and what I provided was not a lot to go on. If I do buy this property, I will not be redoing the footing any time in the near future as there are other concerns that need to be addressed more imminently. My budget and wish list will be determined by what happens with other aspects the property, so I don’t have any more information to give.
Though not specifically real estate related, I do have extensive experience negotiating (it’s literally my job) and was not intending to start these negotiations with an apology. What I do know about negotiation is that feelings about what something should cost don’t go very far, but a little bit of information does. I’m trying to draw these sellers away from the emotional feelings towards the property and towards the reality of what their property is. Which is a property that is devaluing daily without maintenance, not their dad’s dream farm. Based on their pricing strategy thus far, and how long they’ve had it on the market, my guess is that they (A) don’t know much about their property and (B) are pricing it based on misinformation and sentimental value.
I do know what I’m willing to pay for the property. They are really trying to market this as a horse property. I’ve put together a list of things that would need to be done before it could even be considered a working horse property.
When we’ve negotiated normal residential properties in the past, we’ve done the same thing. These appliances need to be replaced at a cost of $X, there’s damage to the deck at $X. If these things can be quantified, it provides leverage. I do recognize that leverage is relative. However, I may also have an opportunity to “link and trade”, and this information would benefit those discussions.
#2- I did reach out for professional information, but was told they weren’t comfortable giving estimates without specifics. What they could give me was material cost, which is easy enough to get (and would obviously vary depending on what you go with) but couldn’t tell me what kind of labor would be involved in starting over as they do not know what is under the arena now and what kind of shape it is in. Even a labor rate doesn’t help since I have no concept of how much labor would be required. As I mentioned, I don’t have any experience in footing and wouldn’t even be able to tell them what I think I need. I don’t really blame them, either. That said, I suppose I’m asking the same of readers here. I haven’t found a place locally that seems to genuinely be any kind of expert in equine arena footing installation. I think someone like that would be better to get information, but I haven’t found that company. It’s possible that I don’t know where to look.
Again, I’m really just looking for a very general estimate, but if that’s something that can’t be narrowed down at all based on the information I’ve provided, that’s a fair assessment as well.
Coming to the table with ‘riding ring’ negotiating power won’t, IMO, get you anywhere. Sellers aren’t interested in the cost of rings – especially when they aren’t horse people. Means nothing to them. They are only interested in offers – not the ‘reasons’ for (low) offers. You don’t need to supply them with reasons. Just make an offer you’re comfortable with for the property ‘as is’ .
Again, I go back to the “you have to be comfortable with BS” approach to negotiation.
If you’re buying a horse, you don’t say this is a perfectly conformed horse, with exceptional bloodlines…yada, yada, yada. You point out all the flaws.
In the case of the farm, you have a great list of items to point out. But you seem stuck in the fact that you want “real numbers” for the footing maintenance/upgrades.
So, if the excavators won’t give you exact numbers (which I can understand), make them up.
I’m not saying you pull them out of thin air, but base our estimate on something rational. Perhaps the stone vendors can give you a “minimum” call fee to bring out equipment. Have them quote you their hourly manpower and bulldozer or backhoe time. Use google. Then make up your own estimate, pad it a bit, and present it to them…up to them to counter. You don’t have to do their due diligence for them.
Google is your friend…Here is a Heavy Equipment Forum that quotes $100/hr ($4k per week) to $250/hr ($10k per week) for dozer work…and usually the vendors require a minimum number of hours just to pack up the equipment and show up. And since everything horse-related is a multiple add a multiplier. http://www.heavyequipmentforums.com/…per-hour.3178/
You have made a list of good negotiating points…you have pointed out all the “carrying costs” of the farm and that it would be better to sell to you than to pay carrying costs for a higher offer where the sellers would be negative out of pocket.
So get your arguments together and give a low-ball offer and position the offer like you’re doing them a favor taking the property off their hands…maybe no mortgage, no contingencies, or that you are pre-approved, quick sale, etc.
OP is trying to justify her offer. She is a “nice person.” You have to remember this is not personal it’s business and make your offer and be willing to walk away.
I OP wants to “justify” her offer, OP can explain to sellers that any other horse buyer will be looking at the property the same way as OP. Further, they are dreaming if they think they can sell it as a horse property for all the X, Y, Z reasons you are giving them… So, they have an interested buyer (OP) and they might as well sell it to you for $xxxx offer.
Then walk away and let them counter. They might sit on the offer and realize no one is going to pay their price. You have to be willing to wait them out.
They should be interested in it if they’re marketing this as a horse property, which they are.
This is not something I’m starting out with, but given the disparity in what I plan to offer versus asking price, I’m fully expecting further negotiations, in which case, this information will be useful.
Perhaps I provided too much information. My question is just a ball park estimate of how much it would cost to start over on arena footing.
And I’m saying you don’t need to do the seller’s work for them. If the sellers are marketing it as a horse property, they will soon find out there are no takers at their price. You don’t have to give them the road map for how to fix up the place.
You don’t need estimates. Just state your price, say there are major maintenance items that need taken care of and leave it at that.
When you’re dealing with real-estate, especially “Dad’s farm” inheritance, then logic goes out the window. You can be polite and nice and present your offer based on your analysis, then let them stew on it for a while. But you have to be willing to walk away.
I have bought and sold houses including a 95 acre farm. You have to make your offer “as is” then be willing to walk away.
The footing repair estimates should just be for you so that you have a baseline of how much you will need to invest to bring it up to your standards so you can factor them in to your offer. But you are not obligated to share that with the sellers.
Yes, you get what I’m going for. This is real estate and the people involved know real estate, so I’m trying to use real estate negotiation tactics rather than horse sale negotiation tactics.
I’m fine with making up numbers, but I literally have no idea and not enough knowledge about footing to come up with something. Perhaps it won’t matter since they know even less than I do about arena footing.
OP. Good luck. You sound savvy. I put a reasonable offer in on a neglected but with good bones horse property 6 months ago. It had been on the market 2 years, now 2 years 6 months. It’s also an inheritance. Reason doesn’t typically trump sentiment until the taxes are overdue.
I would consider looking for comps without an indoor/outdoor arena and see what the market says. The walls/roof, etc. of the indoor have some value, but repairing or having to replace the base in either may make it not too dissimilar from starting from scratch, which around here would cost $35-$50k for each, IF they have to haul out material and really start over. Depending on how the property is priced, they may have already taken into account what the existing structures will bring and have discounted the arenas.
It’s seems like you would have had better responses if you just said “what did you pay to redo your arena?” I’ve not had to redo an arena nor have I had horse property but based on friends I would say a minimum of 20k. Sounds like you know what you are doing…hopefully you can get some actual quotes. Good Luck! Hope it works out for you
