I bought a dressage saddle for $1800. The saddle retails new $3000+. I only rode in it for 5 months. I was in pony club at that time so I cleaned it often. The billets are practically brand new with no stress marks and the saddle on has some small scratches on the cantle. Is $1200 asking too much? This family is new to horses and dont know much so I want to make sure I’m not ripping them off while still getting my moneys worth out of it.
The price is what the market will pay. Check some consignment shops and see what the saddle is selling for
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Yes, check the market. Of course you will only see asking price, not what the thing sold for. Also typically consignment stores are taking a % cut of the price, so the owner gets much less than a private sale.
Typically a used saddle in good condition is about half of retail. The price could be more if the saddle is only a couple years old and barely used. Less if the saddle is say over ten or 15 years old, even if it’s in good shape.
The big question is whether the saddle fits the horse. Is there a fitter involved? If this is the right saddle, that’s a good deal. If it’s the wrong saddle it’s an expensive mistake.
Check ebay and see if there are saddles of the same brand selling, see what they are asking or do a google search and see if any shops have used ones and how they are priced. If the saddle is in really good condition then $1200 seems like a very fair price.
Look on Facebook saddle sales pages or type the kind of saddle into the search and look at posts. You can even narrow it to posts in 2020 to see what it is going for. I recently just came to a happy ending (fingers crossed) of a very long saddle search. If the saddle fits the horse and rider for 1200.00, that is a very reasonable deal based on my recent experience.
The saddle I got retails new for 3200 and I found an older model with some visible cosmetic wear but new flocking/billets for 900.00 shipped. It was a gamble, yet I knew this was a below market price in its condition on the saddle from my research.
Again my guess is your 1200.00 price is more than reasonable.
Happy riding,
Jessie
