Was referring to independently owned and raced sports cars not factory backed, heavily sponsored teams. Have met a couple of car guys who dealt as agents on the speed side, one with sports cars, the other with rally vehicles. No idea what their commission structure was. Never asked and NOMB.
Yeah I guess you do because NORMAL people donât think youâre talking about statistics when you say you that guy over there is normal. LOL
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All - from USEF: https://www.usef.org/forms-pubs/7JarO8pt3CE/2019-usef-equine-transaction-packet
Outlines commissions and clearly states trainer role as an agent on BOTH sell and buy side, meaning commissions on both selling a horse and buying one.
Google search Top 3 results. Itâs 2022 - that packet was written in 2019 - should be a ballpark that is still relevant.
Also this result right after from 2012: https://practicalhorsemanmag.com/lifestyle/how-does-the-horse-sale-commission-system-work-11701/
Specifically talks about the 10-15% âdouble dippingâ and how it is 2 separate transactions. Typically commissions rates donât go down on a time series, per history, so if anything, one could expect to pay possibly MORE in commissions in 2022 for a more rare find ($200k horse).
I think lots of folks frustration with ME PERSONALLY is that I am picking on OP for not knowing this and I guess I assume people think and do some preliminary research before crowd sourcing - that is MY mistake and I own it.
I really thought OP was annoyed AF that they had to pay âwonderful trainerâ well deserved $60k for 2 transactions and that they didnât feel good about spending $60k in transaction fees - hence my commentary to buy a $150k jumper instead of $200k with the IMPLICATION that if theyâre upset with that figure, it likely isnât comfortably affordable.
then chaos ensued about my definition of âaffordableâ and âwealthâ.
Honestly, I think a lot of peopleâs frustration with you is just that your posting here is coming off as condescending and patronizing. 
I have a family member who is extremely wealthy. We went to get candy once and when she heard the price, she put the candy back. It was less than $10. She put it back because she did not think it was worth $10, not because she couldnât afford to literally burn that amount of money and never think twice. No matter how much money you have, you are still allowed to ask if something is worth what you are being asked to spend. No one wants to overpay or be taken advantage of, no matter how little impact it has on your overall financial situation.
OP came asking a hunter/jumper forum for advice on whether something was standard in the hunter/jumper industry. People said yes. OP got the information they asked for, which hopefully eases their mind that the trainer they seem to enjoy working with is operating within the norm and all is kosher. Great!
Iâm just so confused by your apparent need to continue to explain wealth and how wealthy people act/feel on a BB.
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True. At least more so than a horse. Houses do sometimes sell for over asking so thereâs that.
But you reminded me of something I meant to include in my post which is the practice of having the buyer write one check that includes the commission. This has been used to have the buyer pay more than price plus agreed-on commission with trainer or agent or someone pocketing the difference. This practice is likely part of the source of the rancor over paying commissions to trainers. I suspect itâs far better regulated in real estate transactions.
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Chaos ensued hahahah
Have you seen the MB threads? Now that is chaos. This is justâŠsomethinâ
Iâm sure you probably know since you live there, but for anyone reading this thread whoâs California based: the state passed a law specifically pertaining to horse sales that all commissions over $500 must be disclosed in the bill of sale. A small step forward in transparency in the buying-selling process.
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Kentucky too, specifically deals with undisclosed double agency.
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Yes, but try getting it actually put into the bill of sale. I specifically requested that it be part of the BOS for the last horse I purchased (in CA) â yeah, no.
Then I wouldnât have signed the BOS.
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My barn managing self is jumping up and down at this one. As the BO complains about my spending $20 on salt blocks after getting out of their Tesla from their $4M house after their trip to Europe.
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Really good points. Thanks for your sharing your experiences.
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Yes. Though Iâve always cut a separate check to the trainer. Most recent trainer said she does it that way for transparency. Twenty years ago trainer did it bc he didnât trust the seller: it was sort of an in-barn situation and I paid seller the price minus her share of the commission and then paid total commission to trainer separately.
[quote=âAmberley, post:207, topic:778697â]
The difference is that a house has a commonly agreed upon value but a horse in the American HJ market is only worth what the purchasing clients trainer tells them it is worth. That quite clearly opens to door to collusion on prices between buying and selling agents and a system that allows trainers to demand high commissions if the client wants to sell the horse. Thatâs really the crux of the matter to most people who come from the business world.
The idea I keep seeing in this thread that horse professionals are entitled to ask for clients money because they âcan afford itâ is very offputting to a lot of parents and not something they encounter elsewhere. [/quote]
Amen.
The challenge with an unregulated, commission-based environment where wealth abounds is that it encourages price inflation. After all, who in their right mind would leave money on the table? Up $50k here or another $100k there and suddenly itâs a happier time at the barn, right? Or owners doing the same to ease the burn from the commission? No harm, no foul because thatâs the way itâs done.
Many of us have stories of a horse that was one price from the owner and a moment later another from the trainer. This is fine if one is the seller and out to get as much as possible from the sale. Itâs not if one is the buyer. And so very not if one is farther down the line where the horses that were once affordable are now, well, not. When we talk about how our sport has become unaffordable to almost everyone, this topic has to factor in as a cause.
I would never begrudge someone a fair wage for work performed and there are plenty of wonderful, ethical people within the horse world who help their clients find wonderful horses. Contacts and experience should absolutely factor into their fee and yes, they should be compensated if they source a deal. But when the price for the same horse triples with a trainerâs involvement (as someone above said, I apologize for losing track of who), perhaps thereâs something wrong with the system? Or when commissions are arbitrarily applied simply because the horse lives in the barn? Ugh.
I remember once when a friend of our family called about her recently deceased sonâs childrens jumper. She wanted my younger brother to have it in her sonâs memory and gave us her reasonable price. We went to go buy it at the barn and the trainer said no, the price was __ (far higher). Before we could get out friend on the phone (pre mobile), the trainer had pressured a parent in the barn to buy the horse and sign the contract right then. Done and horse lost. To add insult, the trainer wrote a check out to our friend for a fraction of her real sale price.
My point is that when huge sales are made in a relatively ungoverned fashion and handled off to the side or behind closed doors, it becomes an opportunity for people to be taken advantage of, wealthy or not. The OP asked a really basic question about an everyday activity in our sport and the answers have been all over the place. Regardless of oneâs wealth or years in the sport, one cannot walk into a sales situation with someone new and confidently know if the price is real or inflated (because the buyerâs trainer is making money as well) and where the commission will land (pre-contract). At least in the housing market, commissions are fixed and real estate deals are reported and filed with the state. Prices are public knowledge and somewhat justifiable based on a houseâs attributes.
Throughout this thread I couldnât help but think of that scene from Legally Blonde where the store clerk yanked off a discounted tag to sell a dress to the clueless L.A. princess at a higher price, upping her commission in the process.
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Thatâs why it drives me nuts when people wonât put a sale price in the ad. I get you canât put one on Facebook, but put it in the sales video. And post the sale video instead of making people PM you for it.
When the price is publicly listed itâs a lot harder for an unethical agent to try and screw their client. I heard of one recently who said she was going to tell her client the price was $10k higher and keep the difference herself (and likely charge commission on top of it lol). She wanted the seller to back her up on the price. Luckily the seller has ethics and said hell no. People really do suck sometimes.
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Iâve been asked by multiple buyerâs agents to do that. My answer is always âHell no, what you make off your client is something to be worked out between you and them.â
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My coach did that when I was 16, to one of her best friends. Sold the horse for $25k, but she was listed at $15k. Pocketed the $10k, horse owner eventually found out and that was the end of that.
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I donât think itâs âfinancially conservativeâ to agree to pay whatever this (notoriously shady, unregulated) industry asks of its consumers. Was it your or someone else that proposed that the âwealthy workingâ folks are the ones who weigh out the value of fighting over $10K, since they see that in terms of the dollar-value of their time per hour? And you (or the author of this POV, thought that the very wealthy, or those with inherited wealth were much more careful to question every expenditure because their job is to literally conserve the wealth they have rather than generate more?
It seems to me that itâs fiscally conservative to ask about what you are spending your money on⊠and one can decide to do that at any net worth level.
Also, remember that the OP was taking as their guide the conventions of real estate. To me, thatâs a reasonable place for amateurs or horsey-kid parents to start; thatâs a system and commission percentages that they understand.
As I pointed out for the OP somewhere up-thread, the one difference is that horse trainers/traders donât just buy and sell. That is to say, they want more than 3% for their side of a transaction because they arenât doing many of these all year long and commissions arenât their sole source of income (except for a specialized few). So those guys want more per transaction.
IMO, there are no bad questions and I wouldnât shame anyone for asking anything about a financial transaction; or get way into inferring their motives; or suggest that rich and poor people properly should be asking different question. I think everyone should be able to achieve financial literacy, that no one should prevent that, and that it actually works out well for everyone when folks are well-informed, rational players.
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Thanks for your input and adding something that could really help the OP.
I wouldnât have known that about the costs of jumpers and it didnât seem to occur to the rest of us to consider this important factor that you bring up.
I watched a few people sell cars and houses during the over-heated pandemic market for those things, only to suffer some sticker shock when they had to re-buy in⊠wait for it⊠the same over-heated markets. So, it would seem, the non-horsey parent might be apt to get into trouble at this point in their kidâs riding career.
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I charge 10% for everything, have for 30 years. But some trainers charge more, up to 15-20%. Letâs just hope the horse you buy is being priced correctly and not inflated- so trainers can take money off the top.
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