I suppose you can, if you do most of the labor and you don’t count your time and expertise as a cost. If you add that in, doubtful you can make a profit.
If you teach and/or do training with your boarders horses on a consistent basis – or if you offer only field board – then profit is possible.
[QUOTE=bathsheba8542;8220397]
Agree with other posters; the labor cost will kill any potential profit. That means you do it all yourself as a labor of love. : ) I am generating a small bit of profit (that goes to my young horses’ training) when I do the work myself. But, even taking a long weekend away and paying for the farm sitter just kills any little bit of ‘break even’ I might have obtained.[/QUOTE]
This. I have a tiny farmette (3 stalls for retirees only) in an area with high boarding costs, and very few places with quality care. I do the work myself, and make a small “profit,” even with generous bedding and as much hay as they want. For the time being, that goes towards paying back what it cost to build the barn; eventually, it will cover my costs for my own horse whenever he comes home, and allow me to afford to get a second horse (I’d never be able to afford to board 2). It is nothing more than that, and I don’t do it for anyone but friends so as to minimize any stress it could cause.
[QUOTE=clanter;8220965]
There were several specific reasons we did this arrangement, One was to provide liability firewalls (just look at all the threads regaurding horse liability). Another reason was to shield income and provide educational opportunities. [/QUOTE]
:yes:
Possible? Yes.
Likely? No.
Successful boarding is very largely based on location… people want to board their horse near where they live or work, and they would generally mean in more populated areas. (If you live in a more rural area, you’d be more likely to keep your horse at home on your own acreage.)
So if you want to board your horse nearby, that boarding stable is likely to be on fairly expensive land. Therefore, their costs before even considering facilities and horse care are going to be considerable. Land and taxes take a big chunk before the first hay is fed, or first manure is picked up and disposed.
I’ve always kept horses at home, and boarded a few. EZ, right? So when I purchased a commercial boarding facility, I thought I had a pretty good idea how it would work.
I was naive.
The biggest hidden costs are labor (pay my people fair wages because staff turnover is even more expensive) and facility build/repair costs. And this is going into the project with a solid business plan that acknowledged up front that the boarding business would never pay for the initial investment of barns and arena upgrades, a mortgage, or property taxes.
If I was a trainer who also trained and gave lessons from this facility… the horse operations still could not cover the mortgage and property taxes, or facility improvements. So it is a big boondoggle. But I do love my farm and living here, and I have a ‘real job’ that makes it work… mostly.
Our community is a great place to have horses and there are a number of nearby stables. But if you factor in that 1/4 acre residential building lots (and there are not many) sell quickly for upwards of $300,000, you get an idea of what land for horses costs.
If you were lucky enough to live here for many years, and your property is close to paid for along with your barns, you might show a slight profit on boarding, but if you bought/developed/improved any time since the turn of the millennium, a boarding operation simply will not pencil in the black.
It’s easy to get emotionally carried away with the idea of having a farm, but it can become a heartbreaking and soul-crushing endeavor if you don’t approach it with a skeptical business mindset. Do a business plan and get advice from both a successful barn owner and some successful business people you respect before you invest too much in a boarding barn operation. It is rarely a good financial decision, but perhaps an appropriate lifestyle decision.
[QUOTE=Foxglove;8220296]
Husband is a CPA who actually looked into this when we first moved to our area (Northern Indiana). The plan was I would quit my job (teaching high school) and stay home with the three kids (not home schooled) and run a boarding stable. After he did all the numbers, he found at that time (and probably now too) that there was no way to make a profit. The problem we ran into was labor cost. Anyone in our area (or even close to our area) who has the work ethic to show up every day and put in a day’s work, is making $$$$ at the RV and trailer factories. Our high school always had problems keeping kids after they turned 18 because they could walk out our door into a factory and make more than the teachers! With benefits, too!
So for us, in our location, the answer was not possible. There are three boarding stables near me --only one has been in business for 20+ years. She does most of the work herself and trades board for work --but she has a job, too in the “real” world as a Child Advocate or something like that. She hasn’t ridden a horse in 20 years --that I’ve seen --and declines all invitations to ride with others. Her world is that barn, the boarders, the barn parties, etc. But I don’t think she’s doing much better than breaking even. The other two are “labors of love” --one husband and wife (retired) decided to take over a failing boarding stable --they know little about horses but think they are pretty. They hire high school students for after school work. I had a horse there on stall rest for a few months --they called me out one night because he was sick --he was asleep in the stall --sound asleep --lying flat. They didn’t know horses slept like that. I’m glad they called me --always prefer err on the side of caution, but took the horse home soon after when BO stopped taking halters off because they were too complicated to put back on. Other place has had 5 owners in 10 years --nice facility, but everyone who owns it ends up divorced.
If there was a source of reliable labor, maybe, but not here.
Foxglove[/QUOTE]
I ran the numbers for myself as well and came up with pretty much the same conclusion. In addition to labor costs, the cost of a mortgage was huge in my area because location is critical. That means that a barn must be located near the population areas where land is more expensive.
It seems like people often discount the mortgage expense because they figure they would be paying anyway for their own personal horse property. But if you are thinking of going into it for an actual money-making business, be sure to give a realistic estimate for the mortgage when you figure out your expenses. For example, if you were to buy a farmette for your own horses, you might be able to purchase a much smaller facility and/or a farm located farther from town than that which you would need for a successful boarding operation. The difference in price is important for a realistic financial evaluation.
There is your answer.
We looked at a facility near us, and even with all the stalls full, we would be kicking in 5k-10k per month just to break even.
I ran a successful boarding business that made money because the facility and equipment was already in place and paid for, and the facility grew it’s own hay.
When I added in lessons, training, taking kids to shows etc., it paid me a decent living, paid part time barn help and made enough money to do some capital improvements.
The boarding business alone, no lessons, no ancillary services would have made money, but not paid me a living or generated enough income for capital improvements.
Either way, I still worked my butt off and it was more of a lifestyle than a job.
There is no way i could have made it work if I was leasing the facility, or paying a mortgage, or making tractor payments.
In my area, the most common scenario is someone has a small horse property as their primary residence, and takes in boarders to offset the cost of keeping their own horses. Mortgage and taxes are considered personal expenses, not business expenses. This works quite well, but is an entirely different situation than someone trying to run a solely commercial barn for profit
My boarding business runs at a net 0, so basically it makes no money but covers the costs of my own horses. In some years it has run at a loss and I had to pay into it to keep things running. The only way this is possible is the following: The facility is close to a major center in an expensive horsey area so board rates are high. It is a family property and new so maintenance costs are low. I barter housing for some labour. I get shavings from the mill for cheap. I spread compost on my own fields. I only staff part time. I do all of the yard work, mowing, arena maintenance, spreading and other hard labour myself. I have my own horses on grass about 4 months a year to reduce hay costs. I work fulltime in another job off property to have cash flow.
I do not have many boarders. If you had more stalls you could turn a profit in my area with an outright owned property since fixed costs for the power and maintenance would remain the same. With the small number of stalls I have, profit would be impossible.
It’s very difficult to do. Most successful boarding businesses are “successful” because of a combination of the following factors:
BeeHoney’s list is excellent!
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