I had a shareboarder on my horse who ended up stiffing me the last month worth shareboard and now I see her posting multiple times a day on the Facebook sites looking for 1. Work of any type… She says she can train but she had to take my horse inside anytime he got a little hyper (and flatting my horse is a saint)
2. Looking for a horse. One day she was looking for an Arab to do endurance on (our area had 0 endurance barns to my knowledge)
Another day she was looking for an Arab (okay that makes sense for the endurance), then it was a blue roan, then the next day it’s a horse under a grand). In these adds aside from the endurance she doesn’t post skill level or age or even discipline.
It’s annoying to me of course because she owes me money but also from a logistics standpoint is ridiculous. The girl owns no tack and considering the frequency of these changes I know she’s “tire kicking”.
Does anyone else notice people like this on Facebook you know are coming out to try horses just to get a free ride?
Knew them Waaay before anybody ever heard of FB. Ignore them, nothing you can do except cyber stalk them and that’s not ever a good idea on top of a total waste of your time plus looking like a bully, ignore her on FB. Be glad she moved on.
I wouldn’t worry too much about other owners and this gal. She is giving off all the signs of crazy. And she is looking for unicorns (blue roan Arab endurance horse under $1000). Any horse owner who doesn’t spot this or is equally crazy deserves what they get.
I think at some level FB posts like these are an end in themselves. The fantasy is about advertising for a horse, feeling involved in horses. If she wanted free trial rides, she’d be contacting actual sellers, and not asking for something that doesn’t exist. I’d say she doesn’t want to ride, but doesn’t want to admit that to herself. Besides, how much fun is a test ride?
How many people respond to ISO ads, anyhow? Usually, all the horses up for sale in a given area are listed on sales sites. If you are really shopping, you comb through those yourself, do your short list, and the buyer initiates contact. I have to say, I wouldn’t respond to ISO ads from strangers. If I saw a trainer I knew had an ISO ad up, and my horse matched that, I would contact. But random people, especially “searching for free companion horse, unsound OK, big draft preferred”: I think kill buyer!
