To me, there’s no comparison. I like my horses and WANT to be around them; boarding and having to schedule time to go VISIT just won’t work. It’s like having a husband who lives across town and you see for a couple of hours at a time. I’ve boarded and done self-care boarding, which is the WORST of both worlds. You still don’t get to see the horse(s) that much and taking care becomes a CHORE instead of pleasant time together.
Mini farm for sure. I hate keeping my horses out, unless I am paying top $$, but even then, people take short cuts.
Re the horsemanship thing; when your horses are at home you get to know them in a way that you will never experience having to go visit them. That alone has taught me more than I ever dreamed I could know. And I am so glad that my daughters got raised with this knowledge too.
Having mine at home has allowed me to retire a few that I couldn’t have afforded to keep if I had to pay board costs. It also allowed me to breed a few and learn about raising and starting them. Nothing was better than 3 am waking the family and being there for the miracle in the barn. I would never add up what this has cost, I could have had that showplace house, but the choices we made were life style and I would never trade that.
[QUOTE=Frog Pond;8440676]
OP, wildlifer’s point about shopping with soil maps is a GREAT one.[/QUOTE]
Yes, and check your FEMA flood maps as well.
I’m considering a couple acres myself, not to keep horses on now but to just live on, as an investment and to be close to my boarding barn. My area is rife with flood-prone lowlands and wetlands, and when we had our monsoon rains this past summer, many horse people were caught by surprise. Here, higher land is higher in value.
