How do people afford to consistently show multiple horses?

[julia.eq.h]

I’ve had a question I’ve wondered for years: how do people afford the higher levels of the hunter/jumper world?

I am a rider who comes from an upper middle class family, so I’m able to afford the 150+ lesson rates per hour and the leases in Silicon Valley. My family can’t easily afford an expensive lease and horse though, but this doesn’t seem the case for the majority of people around me. It’s not just some people, it seems like everyone is able to afford this stuff! How are people spending six figures on one horse, let alone multiple?

What jobs are these people doing? (Let me know… for the future haha)

Is it mostly wealth, or just families who sacrifice a lot for their riders?

[Tha_Ridge]

It’s called generational wealth.

[clanter]

read up on how Rita Crundwell financed her horse habit

[poltroon]

The economy is structured in the US right now in a way that creates big winners who make hugely more money … essentially on luck. Sometimes it’s generational wealth, sometimes it’s being in the right place at the right time. In Silicon Valley, you have people making eyepopping salaries sometimes of several hundred thousand a year, or being fortunate to be part of a startup that is bought out at a handsome premium. Sure, they’re good at their jobs, most of the time. But there are also a lot of very talented people (both in Silicon Valley and elsewhere), people just as capable, who are making salaries that are more down to earth. And once you have a few spare hundred thousand, you can use that money to create additional passive income.

People spending six figures on one horse every year, whether for an adult or a child, are in fact incredibly, unnormally (in the mathematical sense) wealthy. People doing it on multiple horses even more so.

I would say that the skill you most need to cultivate to be one of them is charisma. Regardless of any other training you might have, the ability to sound confident and tell people to give their money to you is how you get money if you weren’t born with it. That skill can of course be used for good, I don’t mean to say otherwise. It’s just that the fanciest STEM degree and being the smartest person in the room isn’t nearly as lucrative as sounding like the smartest person in the room.

But confidence, and selling yourself and your skills is a skill that can be learned.

Generational wealth is still the best way, so you have the time to ride those nice horses!

[fivestrideline]

Generational wealth. Seriously.

Even if family isn’t paying for the horse habit, they’ve paid for the high end education, made the connections (personal and business), often footed the bill for housing/transportation/etc, all of which makes affording a hobby like this so much easier. There are a lot of “self made” people out there that look very lucky, but their family gifted them millions of startup costs and have paid for their living expenses and got them the internships.

Normal people aren’t spending a mortgage payment every month on their hobby. That’s out of reach for most middle class people (the middle class doesn’t really exist in the US anymore anyway), and plenty are out there doing this in wildly irresponsible ways that will impact their finances later. It’s a studied thing that most people who call themselves “middle class” are actually firmly upper class - it’s the uber-rich are SO far away from the rest of society that it makes wealthy people feel middle class.

Anyway, that’s my soapbox. There’s a reason people showing multiple horses on the circuit are competing against Jobs and Gates and Hadid and Springsteen. That’s the kind of disposable income we are talking about! My advice is to not compare yourself to them. There are lucrative careers out there, but you’ll never work your way at a regular job into the kind of wealth you’re talking about! That’s windfall money, sports and entertainment star money.

[Irene2022]

The common thread I see among those in my area who can afford a healthy budget (but certainly not to the level you mention) is that they are established in their jobs and have chosen career paths that have room for growth. They’ve had enough years of experience to bill for more as a doctor or a lawyer, achieve raises, or become an executive in their company. And for a lot of those too, it’s a sacrifice of a work-life balance meaning less time to ride in exchange for making the money to afford to ride.

What a lot of my friends are doing is trying to find other paths that either reduce expenses or bring them joy and accomplishment in the sport. For example, working with cheaper green horses to either bring up the ranks or try to flip, trying their hand at another discipline such as eventing or dressage as a way to breakup HJ show, using low-paying but flexible jobs to lower other costs like shipping and care at the shows, working in governance to try to improve the sport, etc.

[Djones]

Marry tech money or make tech money LOL

[Eclectic_Horseman]

Fortune 500 CEO. Or a management consultant to the Board of one of those companies.

You could have 5 mansions all over the globe. Or 5 mega yachts Or multiple horses in a high end market on training board and showing.

Better yet, the spouse or child of one of those folks.

[Amberley]

Buy a house 20-30 years ago. If your mortgage is $1600 vs $4800 that pays for a lot of showing.

[phoenixrises]

I make good money. I did not make good money for a very long time (and came from an HVAC father where we never did own a home) so most of my now good money goes to paying off debt. I do pay a mortgage a month for my horse, however, I’m lucky if I can make 2 shows a year (and that’s because I set aside a portion of my bonus).

So if someone made what I made now, but didn’t come with debt, they could pretty easily enjoy the lower circuits (not the WEF or even the WEC, but comfortably do the HITS, or Princeton). WEF money, that is a different level.

I work in tech, but for years I’ve worked in tech and not made what I make now. What I have now is a mix of luck and talent. All I can say is don’t be afraid to look for a job that values you but that means moving and keeping your resume up to date.

[Scribbler]

@julia.eq.h

I’ve had a question I’ve wondered for years: how do people afford the higher levels of the hunter/jumper world?

I am a rider who comes from an upper middle class family, so I’m able to afford the 150+ lesson rates per hour and the leases in Silicon Valley. My family can’t easily afford an expensive lease and horse though, but this doesn’t seem the case for the majority of people around me. It’s not just some people, it seems like everyone is able to afford this stuff! How are people spending six figures on one horse, let alone multiple?

What jobs are these people doing? (Let me know… for the future haha)

Is it mostly wealth, or just families who sacrifice a lot for their riders?

As everyone has said, generational wealth. To hit this level of showing you really need to have the wealthy parents. Because by the time you earn the money yourself you’ll be a bit older and you may no longer have the appetite for big heights or be so competitive. And there is no job in the world that gives you the income and the free time to spend the winter on the Florida show circuit.

[NoSuchPerson]

@julia.eq.h

My family can’t easily afford an expensive lease and horse though, but this doesn’t seem the case for the majority of people around me. It’s not just some people, it seems like everyone is able to afford this stuff!

The reason that it feels like “everyone” is able to afford this stuff is that you live in an area where average incomes are skewed way high. The “majority of people” around you are not representative of 99% of the US population.

@julia.eq.h

How are people spending six figures on one horse, let alone multiple?

They have lots of money. Lots more than you do. It’s as simple as that.

As a kid, I was sort of the token middle-class student at the place I rode, so I completely understand how it is to look around you and see your lesson group friends graduate to owning nice horses and hitting the show circuit while you continue to ride lesson horses and show at the barn’s schooling shows. I got to show at one rated show/year, the one held annually on the grounds of my home stable.

When I got a little whiny over my friend Linda’s parents buying her a really nice horse, my Dad gave me a blunt lesson in economics. I didn’t like it much.

[Demerara_Stables]

As everyone above has said. As a fellow Bay Area resident, I can tell you that the clients I’ve had here (which aren’t even the level you’re talking about, but the “average” bay area horse owner) have way more money than I would’ve ever had, had I not moved here gotten into tech, and had a husband in tech as well. The money in this area is insane, and isn’t a good representative of most horse people.

[skip99]

Just reiterating the sentiment that a lot of it is generational wealth. There may be some who own their own business or struck gold on an IPO. Some work for FAANG. Even at the salary and options provided FAANG companies I’m not sure that, on its own, affords the opportunity to own and show multiple 6 figure horses.

My perspective based on anecdotal knowledge would be the former group is more common in what you see especially in the juniors - being supported by their families, some with extremely high levels of wealth.

At my age, mid thirties, I know far more people who are allocating their money in a way that they find appropriate vs what I would do, but even then they are being budget conscious because six figures is a huge amount for an animal that pretty regularly tries to find ways to die- developing young horses, taking on quirky ones at a discount, etc.

[GraceLikeRain]

Theoretical, not so atypical family at the top of the sport:
Mom has 2 hunters, oldest daughter has a big eq and a jumper, and youngest daughter has a small and a medium. The Palm Beach Sports Commission 2023 report says that the average WEF participant had 2 horses so that feels reasonable.

This imaginary family has 6 horses/ponies in full training so $18k/month plus vet/farrier/new equipment is around $225k as a baseline.

The average cost per horse at WEF was $40,060. Let’s say they take all 6 horses. That’s another $240k.

Throw in a few more multi week shows, a new horse because out of 6 horses someone is going to be retiring/coming up lame/needing to step down/etc. and annually, it’s probably a $1M family hobby.

The top 0.1% in 2021 made around $3M which is about the minimum where that family would need to be to start that type of lifestyle and it would require a comparatively very modest rest of their life. Not that living on $2M is nothing but if you can spend 1/3 of income pre tax on a hobby, it would require a very unique mindset.

Likely they would need more. The top .01% is around $7M annually, which is probably more of the starting point for the people you see picking up tricolors at the acronym shows week after week.

People in this bracket own multiple smaller businesses, are commercial developers, Fortune 500 c-suite, own a few auto dealerships or food and beverage companies, etc. However, by the time they have enough liquid I think they are typically becoming the parents or the grandparent funding the next generation.

Every single person I know on a true personal level who is showing to this degree has significant generational wealth even if they are also a doctor/lawyer/CPA/etc. Their $300-700k salaries allow them to live a very very nice lifestyle but it isn’t sending multiple horses out on the road or letting them pick up a $150k three year old prospect.

[BostonHJ]

As others have said - generational wealth perhaps combined with the current bread winner of the family having leveraged that wealth into something more. It is easy to think most people around you can afford an expensive lease/horse/unlimited showing when you ride at a barn that focuses on those things. I have been largely out of horses for a few years after having been in the sport for 30+ years - going back to WEC after a little break, I saw for the first time that this is a rich person’s game. The rest of us may find a way to play in the sandbox, but we aren’t going to be showing 20 weeks a year with our multiple horses capable of ribboning, full stop.

I learned it was substantially cheaper for me to have a second HOUSE instead of one horse in a high cost of living area.

[Midge]

@Amberley

Buy a house 20-30 years ago. If your mortgage is $1600 vs $4800 that pays for a lot of showing.

That’s two shows, if you are already covering everything else horse related. That is still someone hitting the top 20%, assuming you put almost every extra dollar into horses.

[wanderlust]

@poltroon

Sometimes it’s generational wealth, sometimes it’s being in the right place at the right time. In Silicon Valley, you have people making eyepopping salaries sometimes of several hundred thousand a year, or being fortunate to be part of a startup that is bought out at a handsome premium. Sure, they’re good at their jobs, most of the time. But there are also a lot of very talented people (both in Silicon Valley and elsewhere), people just as capable, who are making salaries that are more down to earth.

If this isn’t the god’s honest truth. I turned down a job at a SF startup because I had just started at another one and didn’t want to job hop. The one I turned down was acquired a month later, and the person who ended up taking that role made $4 million after 3 weeks because their options vested immediately upon acquisition. The one I was at hummed along and grew well, but 15 years later the owner still has not sold or taken any outside cash so no one has made money there.

[vxf111]

They’re rich, much richer than 99% of the people in this country. There are different ways of becoming that rich, some legitimate and some less so, but that’s the answer. Nobody showing multiple horses on the circuit at the highest levels is scrapping it or roughing it or doing something ingenious. They’re wildly wealthy.

[Spudsmyguy]

Not to hijack, but what about trainers? I know two who own their own horses and show in the higher levels? How do they afford it? They don’t have sponsors either.