Games Trainers Play: The Florida Horse Saga

[findeight]

@eponacowgirl;2789914

One of the options we’re thinking of is telling the buyer that if she buys, she doesn’t have to pay any gas money, if she doesn’t buy she’ll owe my friend. Is this fair?

Missed this part the first read.

If buyer doesn’t buy she is going to say Buh Bye, I’ll send a check later and friend is going to be broke college student with rig and horse 400 miles from home. If she does buy, is friend going to tack on the $300+ or so it’s going to cost in gas to get there plus motel and any flats or other repairs that crop up? How about for hauling the empty trailer back?

No, that’s not fair. Fair is person requesting the horse be hauled down there pays in advance for horse to be hauled down there-and returned if they don’t want it.

[summerhorse]

No kidding!

Seller should tell buyer to hop on a plane and stay a week in a motel and try the horse at its own barn.

[Luckydonkey]

First of all how can you even get a true feeling of how a horse will go if you haul it 14plus hours - then where is horse going to stay so potential buyer can try it out- there is just too much that can go wrong with this scenario…I would tell buyer I would haul horse down for her only if she prepaid me with a $1000 non refundable deposit- and that if she buys the horse, she gets half of it towards the purchase price- that way buyer is out $500 for hauling expenses, and if she does not like horse seller is paid for her time/expenses of hauling in advance.

[pegasus209]

Go back and read findeights 1st post–everything you need is there!
If wannabe buyer is serious, she would know she needs to make a trip to see the horse, OR, pay full costs by a professional hauler , (if she really is that dumb!) Round trip paid in FULL, in case it doesn’t work out. If you go that route you better have an ironclad contract though.

I hope we get an update later telling us she was told to go jump in the lake! lol

[Huntertwo]

I’m in the no effing way camp! What #alls to even ask in the first place!

The owner is going to go through all the B.S. to ship to FL., food, fuel, tolls, wear/tear on her rig, Hotel, with the possibility the horse might not even sell? Or even being guaranteed that she’ll collect any $$$ for her hassle?

Or is the buyer hoping that once seller arrives, she might try to beat her down on price, so she doesn’t have to haul the horse all the way back home?

Tell her to get a plane ticket! People never cease to amaze me.:no:

[findeight]

Oh, yeah, there are also health requiremnts and documentation required…and I hear Fla does check. Who pays for the vet work?

And who pays for horse to stay somewhere while being tried?

[gieriscm]

No way in he!! should it even be considered. The seller is in college; she needs to be attending her classes, not taking a several-day trip with her horse to Florida because someone down there might buy her horse.

The purchaser can fly/drive to Florida a lot more easily.

[Event4Life]

I’ve never heard of anything like this. When I tried horses a few trailered over, but that was after we offered to go out to their respective owners farm and see them. The owners wanted to trailer them in because the farm I was at had better facilities. We’re talking trailering 15 miles though…there’s a huge difference between that and the distance between Florida and Kentucky. IMO if the owner offers to trailer, then that’s ok…if the buyer asks, esepcially at that distance, then no deal. Would you ship the horse yourself? Who pays for gas/a company to ship? Who pays for the health certificate? Would you sign an agreement? Would you go down with the horse? How many days would the horse be there for? What happens if the horse is injured on the way, or at the farm? Too many liability issues here.

[RainyDayRide]

this seems to be one of those rare COTH threads where all the responders are in agreement

[horse-loverz]

[QUOTE=RainyDayRide;2790211]
this seems to be one of those rare COTH threads where all the responders are in agreement :)[/QUOTE]

Isn’t that one of the signs of the Apocolypse???:lol:

[findeight]

But when we all agree, person tends to do stuff anyway:no:

[SillyHorse]

Exactly what I was thinking. But, the OP hasn’t come back with a lot of rationalizations for doing it, so maybe she will help her friend to JUST SAY NO.

[frugalannie]

Just to extend the potential buyer’s ridiculous logic, if this was the way business was done in the horse world, we wouldn’t have to go to Europe to see horses we liked on videos. The sellers would ship them over for us to try in the comfort of our home barns.

In other words: DON’T DO IT!.

[dressagetraks]

Insane. No way. The only time I ever considered a horse (for trade) that was shipped several states for me to try out, the horse’s owner was already coming down for a week with my trainer with her other horses anyway, so it was just a slot on an already-coming trailer, arrangements suggested by them. I didn’t pitch in anything on that one. If a trip was made just for me, I would have paid gas.

I would never ship a horse several states for someone else to try without a written contract to reimburse all expenses, whether the buyer bought or not. And like many have said, much cheaper for the buyer to come look. The buyer or prospective buyer should be responsible for shipping costs and gas, both ways, whether she buys or not.

[ESG]

@TwoArabs;2790037

The buyer is prabably pretty sure she wants the horse and just doesn’t want to pay to have it transported.

No. Buyer isn’t serious, or she’d haul her hindparts up to see the horse. Buyer is bull$h!tting poor college student into hauling horse down, with no comp for poor college student’s time, gas, boarding/vet expenses, etc, etc, etc. Nope - buyer isn’t serious, or in touch with reality. :rolleyes:

[Eq3nStar]

Ah- my bad reading too fast I’d still say no.

[sidepasser]

why is it that I can see this horse taking a wrong step off the trailer after traveling that far and twisting, scraping, laming itself and buyer shakes head “sadly” and says thanks, but I don’t want him now"???

what is wrong with this picture, are horses that cheap that you have to haul them to the buyer to get them seen, much less sold???

aaacckkkk I am thankful, grateful, and appreciative to the universe that I sold my horses that I had for sale way, way back in the early spring.

But I do know that I would love to have a really nice Dutch Warmblood mare, do you think some one will ship me one to try out??? lol…(I will even take a chestnut one with no chrome.)

[Sandy_M]

Whoa! No way. Heck, I drove nearly 400 miles to look at a prospect (which I did end up buying). I couldn’t imagine saying to the seller, “Hey, I saw “X” on your website. Would you please haul him up here for me to look at.” Geesh. What nerve. Too many risks for too nebulous a return for the seller.

[Beenthere]

Let me play this out for you:

Horse is shipped and gets to Florida. They tell you gee, we should not ride him until tomorrow because he is tired. Then friend spends money on hotel room. Then well we tried him but we need to sit on him one more day. Friend gets a hotel room. Then, well we like him but need to set a vetting (in Florida usually takes a few days) so horse can be vetted in 4 days. (This translates to friend go home and we will test the crap out of the horse when you leave). Horse gets vetted and is sore because he was over worked and vet says rest of exam in a few days. Then oh we need to wait a week for blood results. Then oh we will buy the horse for substantially less because now your friend has been without her horse for 3 weeks and does not have the money to come back and get the horse so she is pressured to sell for less.

This is the most common trick in the book. Or as we all know, certain trainers promise the world, write bad checks and runs off with your horse. This happens a bunch in Florida.

If you can find a third party you trust to receive the horse and stable it for a few days and run the show for you great.

If not, tell them they can put full sale price in your account and they can ship the horse and you keep money if horse is not back in 4 days

tickets to ky are cheap

[AnotherRound]

This idea is so unresonable, and unresponsible to the seller and to the horse in question, I am stunned. Can you say “sucker”? Not trying to put the owner down, just trying to say this in a way which shakes her up a bit. Get a spine, do what’s right for her horse, never mind what’s appropriate for her own circumstances. The idea of bringing a horse anywhere for a looker (not yet a buyer) at the seller’s expense is really thoughtless.