Leasing My Horse Out--struggling with fair price

[Annie53642]

So, I’m a broke college student who owns a horse. Nice OTTB that I bought as an upper level prospect that has been restarted on the flat but college has kept me from going further. I have a friend who’s an experienced rider and we agreed to do a lease splitting cost, even though this would be a full lease on her part (I will not be riding the horse). Well, we’re struggling on finding a fair price point, and I’m struggling to keep paying for the horse. Right now, she’s thinking I should pay board and insurance (which is roughly $300-350/month depending on winter or summer) and she pays everything else, which currently comes to roughly $200/month + yearly shots/coggins (~$300/year), with the idea being that as the horse progresses, she will have to pay more for feed, chiro, etc. If I wasn’t so strapped on money, this would be fine with me, but my parents are helping me fork the cost since I don’t make enough to pay for the horse on my own, and they think it’s unfair for me to pay more for the next six months since I’m not even riding it. Can I get opinions on what I should do or what a fair price point would be? Is the arrangement listed above fair?

EDIT: If she does not lease the horse, I can send it home to my parents farm where it will sit until I graduate (approx. 2 years). She will be advancing the horse’s training, but in a different discipline (dressage vs. eventing)

2nd EDIT: Horse is not currently insured, but have talked to insurer (work for man who owns insurance agency) and he suggested insuring horse for $10-15k along with major medical

3rd EDIT: She approached me about riding horse since I had mentioned before my lack of time for riding, and if this works out well and she’s competing, I have said I would be okay with doing a long-term lease or possible lease-to-buy situation. But, as of this point, she says she only wants to lease the horse until she graduates.

[Sugarwells]

Leaser pays all costs.

[drafting_dots]

That doesn’t seem fair to me. If I were in that situation, the very minimum of fair would be add up all costs and split down the middle, but she is essentially full leasing the horse so really should be paying everything. The reason I would consider half is because it sounds like you really want her to work with the horse and she would be helping you almost as much as you are helping her. Make sure you have her sign a comprehensive contract; this already sounds messy.

[poltroon]

This situation sounds a little difficult because it sounds like both you and your potential lessee are strapped for money.

Fair? What is fair is that your lease rider, who has the horse 100% of the time, pay the board and insurance; ie 100% of the cost.

However, both of you are also looking at your alternatives for not doing this deal.

If your other choice is to pay for someone to work the horse and continue to pay full freight, you may still want to do this deal, because you want the horse back in 6 months, and you’ll get, you hope, a horse that is sound, fit, and at a good place in his training. If your friend is a really good rider, you may also get some training out of it.

If your other choice is that you can find another lessee who will pay the full cost, or if your other palatable choice is to sell the horse, you should probably pick one of those.

Finding a lessee can be really hard.

Her other choices might be not riding at all, or riding a school horse, or riding some other horse. How undesirable are those for her?

You losing money on the horse so she can ride only makes sense if you want to continue owning this horse in the future, and you don’t have better prospects.

These kinds of arrangements are really sticky, in that what makes the most economic sense is often not how it goes, because we really prefer a particular lessee or because we prefer particular locations or because it’s hard to find another choice. So weigh your alternative: what will the costs be to you if she doesn’t lease the horse? If you’re not getting some benefit over putting the horse in a field for six months, then decline.

By the way, if your lessee is not actually strapped for money but just is trying to negotiate hard with you, then I wouldn’t want to do the lease at all. The most important thing for me in a lease is someone that I’m comfortable working with and creating consensus with in terms of making sure my horse gets the care I expect. So ask yourself, if you were expecting her to pay for more feed, say, and you think the horse needs it, will she follow through or will she say it’s not necessary in order to save a buck?

[trubandloki]

Is the person who is leasing your horse of a riding level where they will be advancing the horse’s training?

I think the answer to that question makes your lease deal fair or not.

[x-halt-salute]

Only you and your friend can evaluate whether it’s fair. What you describe is not conventional IME.

Most of the “friendly” leases (part leases, and what some might call “free leases”) I’ve seen or been involved with have been negotiated by factoring in all regular expenses (board, shoeing, insurance, routine vet care, etc.) divided by the proportional use of the horse (taking into account horse’s days off). Often owners will pay for some routine expenses (e.g.providing supplements or paying vet or farrier bills) without factoring those items into the lease cost, but the you-cover-this, I-cover-that, hopefully-the-math-works sort of split you describe above isn’t something I’ve encountered before.

Long story short, it sounds like your friend is getting a great deal on a full lease regardless of whether she’s paying the basic monthly bills (board, insurance) or the incidental and less frequent bills (farrier, supplements, annual vet care, etc.). If she enjoys riding this horse she’s really making out like a bandit – a full lease that is priced at only 40% of the horse’s costs isn’t the norm.

You, of course, are also doing ok by having your horse in the care of someone you know and trust and not having to fully support it, and it seems reasonable that you would be willing to pay some of the costs to make this possible. It sounds like what that’s worth to you, though, is something less than the ~60% of the horse’s upkeep that you would assume under the arrangement you describe above. So the question I have is what percentage of the horse’s costs are you willing and able to pay to make this situation work out?

Were I in your shoes I would go back to the drawing board, figure out the current total cost of keeping the horse, the estimated cost of additional supplementation with increased work, and compute an average monthly estimated upkeep cost for the term of the lease. Use that as your starting point, figure out a percentage split that you can both live with, and use a calculated dollar amount instead of the cost of services and supplies that may change over time to figure each party’s contributions. And make sure you have a good contract – there are a lot of things that need to be agreed upon in advance to make a lease clear and compatible with both parties’ expectations.

[luvmyhackney]

Horse would go to my parents for the next couple of years and get pulled out if retirement when I got out of college. Otherwise friend would pay all expenses to lease horse. Not your job to finance her riding.

[findeight]

Why the heck should you pay full board and insurance if you will not be riding the horse? That defies logic. At most you should go 50/50 on all expenses and that only if you are afraid the friendship will fail if you don’t pay anything towards your horses upkeep while she has 100% use of him. What is the horses insured value? Is he currently insured?

One sided deals like this are the ones that stand the best chance of going south, especially if (let’s get real here, when) the horse gets hurt and is unrideable for a spell? Or either side, if not both, can’t handle their share of expenses. Seen it a million times, don’t do it. It gets real ugly.

Really sound like njether one if you is in a position to financially support the horse, OPs parents are still backstopping her expenses and one mustep and vet bill us going to create an epic fail on this whole deal.

Free lease him to her, you pay nothing, she pays all expenses except purchase price. And whatever you do, contract, contract, contract and you need to be willing to enforce the terms if/when she can’t financially hold up her end.

Really better to sell the horse on in situations like this. For their sake.

[mmeqcenter]

Personally, I find it exceedingly annoying when people want someone to pay to “lease” their green horse. Leaser is going to essentially be doing all the training on this green horse for the next six months, and they have to pay you to do so instead of getting paid like a trainer would? I’ve done it before, and it’s not something I’d sign up for again, myself. Therefore, I’d say what the leaser has proposed is quite fair. If the horse were “finished” or more advanced and she’d be able to just enjoy the ride and pop around shows, then most/all of the costs would absolutely be covered by the leaser.

[cheektwocheek]

For my on premises lease they pay 100% board, lessons and 1/2 of the farrier fees. I maintain supplements and routine Vet bills.

[Redlei44]

It is unclear to me from your post - what is the actual amount of cash you can afford each month to keep the horse with you? If your parents are saying they won’t help pay for someone else to ride the horse, and you are broke - doesn’t it sort of answer itself? You can tell your friend that the horse is available if she picks up all/most of the expenses. Otherwise you’re sorry but he has to go to your family’s pasture.

As others have noted, IME the standard for a full lease is that the lessee pays all regular expenses. Board, shoes, etc. The fact that she’s “helping you out” by keeping the horse going might indeed be worth something to you, but does not automatically mean that you owe a particular percentage of the monthly bills.

[Natalie]

How green is this horse? I agree with @mmeqcenter on some level–even “free” leasing a horse (they cover all or the majority of expenses but pay no fee to you) that is very green can be kind of a bum deal, as yes, if you’re a good rider, you are training the horse for essentially free.

However, if I read your post correctly it sounds as though you want this horse to eventually be an event horse, though you lack the time and funds to keep moving him up now. Your friend is a good rider but only interested in dressage…is that right? If so, then while she is still training your horse for essentially free, it’s not in full furtherance of your ultimate goal. You’ll have a well-schooled dressage horse when this is all said and done that still hasn’t seen a cross country jump or bopped around a stadium course. In that case, I think a far more fair arrangement would be one in which she covers the bulk of the routine costs–definitely full board and the farrier as well. You could cover vet bills and perhaps any supplements and extras. She should cover her own lesson and/or show costs.

If this really won’t work I would ship it home to your parents to sit and just be a horse until you have the time and money to put into bringing it along on your own.

[ElementFarm]

I agree with mmeqcenter.

It sounds like your horse, while having potential, is still not confirmed at lower levels, let alone upper. So if your friend is an accomplished rider/trainer, and will be developing your horse for you, then I’d say paying only board/insurance is a screaming deal for you! She’d be footing the bills for shows, lessons, all the vet/chiro support required for a horse that she won’t even get to keep as it moves up the levels, or sell for a profit when it reaches its peak.

While a been-there-done-that type of horse is easier to lease, and will either be a paid lease, or at least a free (to owner) lease, this doesn’t sound like that kind of situation. If you can’t afford board, then your options are to try to find a free leaser out there that is good enough to deal with a green horse, or sell the horse, or send it your parents or pasture board at a place you can afford. But honestly, getting your horse free training and continued fitness while you can’t do that for him, sounds like a dream situation. Heck, I have to pay people to hack my nice show horses when I can’t ride them. I’d love a situation like your friend is offering. And while she may not event him, solid dressage training will benefit a horse in any discipline, and make it much easier to start him over fences in 2 years when you’re ready.

it’s tough being a broke college student. I’ve been there! It might make more sense to sell the OTTB now, and get something else in a few years after you graduate and find a job. There’s no guarantee that your horse will be the upper level horse you hope he will, and in 2 years at your parents’ house, he could get injured, sick, etc. and even with your parents footing the basic bills, 2 yrs of shoeing/trimming and vet work adds up.

[jherold]

I leased a green horse several years ago. We split the board. I paid routine vet and they paid shoes. If your short funds, I would insure for the minimum amount to get major medical. If you’re not using him, you wouldn’t need to replace him immediately, so save some bucks there.

[poltroon]

You’re not going to like hearing this, but I think also if you’re looking at sending him home to be turned out for two years, that you should offer him for sale now, if he is currently fit and rideable. Two years is a long time and when you graduate you still may be in a situation without much money or time, and then you’ll have a horse that’s unfit and will need several months to get going again. I’m sure you see a lot in this horse, but in two or three years he’ll be that much older and still just be a green prospect, so maybe no longer suited to be your upper level horse nor anyone else’s.

There are always prospects out there when you have the time again.

[atlatl]

@mmeqcenter

Personally, I find it exceedingly annoying when people want someone to pay to “lease” their green horse. Leaser is going to essentially be doing all the training on this green horse for the next six months, and they have to pay you to do so instead of getting paid like a trainer would? I’ve done it before, and it’s not something I’d sign up for again, myself. Therefore, I’d say what the leaser has proposed is quite fair. If the horse were “finished” or more advanced and she’d be able to just enjoy the ride and pop around shows, then most/all of the costs would absolutely be covered by the leaser.

On the flip side, I found it exceedingly annoying when a novice rider wanted me to pay her to ride my schoolmaster in lessons because she was “exercising” him. That didn’t fly one bit, and the situation was short-lived. (BTW, I charged her $20 a ride).

Frankly, if this leaser wants to ride any horse she’d be having to come up with not only the maintenance expenses but also the purchase price.

I’m in the camp of splitting things 50/50 is more than generous.

[Groom_amp_Taxi]

I think the big variable we all know nothing about is just how experienced and capable OP’s potential lease rider/friend is. If she is of the caliber that other people would pay her to ride and train their horses, then something in the general range of what has been proposed seems like it would be fair to both sides. If she is not at that level, then the terms she’s asking for seem to be quite favorable to her.

[x-halt-salute]

I guess I must be more cynical than most, because I don’t understand the assumption that the friend is someone who is talented enough to bring the horse along in training. IME riders who have the tact and experience to train are relatively rare. Broke college kids who have the talent and time and resources to bring a greenish horse up the levels in dressage are vanishingly rare. Usually just finding someone to lease who won’t instill bad habits or cause other problems is enough of a feat, let alone lucking into someone with real training talent who wants to ride a greenish horse.

It’s great that OP has someone she trusts who can keep the horse fit and work on things that could be useful to OP some day, but I wouldn’t expect the situation to necessarily result in truly valuable training unless the friend is investing significantly in instruction. If OP weren’t in a sticky situation would she be willing to pay $350/month or something in the $15-$20/ride ballpark to this person as a training fee? If not, the value added by the friend’s training abilities probably isn’t sufficient to justify the scale of the subsidy. Doesn’t matter if the horse is green – if the friend isn’t interested in riding green horses (and gaining valuable experience in the process) she presumably wouldn’t have inquired about riding OP’s green horse.

With the new info, I’d probably lean toward sending the horse home to parents’ farm if an arrangement couldn’t be reached that brings the OP’s costs more in line with her actual finances and sense of fairness.

[NorthernHunter]

The friend paying variable expenses should also stipulate frequency and minimum expectations (I.e. farrier expense: trim and shod every five weeks, with snow pads in winter, by Joe the farrier). This will prevent someone from cutting corners with care (I.e switching to a cheaper farrier every 12 weeks) that might negatively impact the horse on a long term basis.

Giving the friend something more concrete (x dollars for 50% of the horse bills, or 80% of board cost) will reduce the variability of cost / allow friend and you owner to more accurately budget for horse care.

I’ve chosen in the past to allow my horse downtime instead of leasing due to the possibility of her being overused… obviously horses can get injured turned out too, but I don’t think the owner should necessarily pay 100% board for someone else to get 100% use of the horse.

[Bogie]

It depends on whether she is truly skilled enough to train your horse. To me, that claim is always the kiss of death because half the time you get your horse back with a few new bad habits. Sometimes it works out but generally when someone is riding your horse full time they pay the costs.

One more (added) comment. I currently allow a young woman to ride my OTTB. I do not charge her. She is a nice rider and he likes her. He’s very picky and can be a real handful if he gets upset, so it’s worth it to me for him to get some extra work with a rider he likes. I do NOT think she is training him or adding value, but it she’s a nice girl who helps me out and is good at taking instructions. My horse is well established in his training and is not going to be noticeably impacted by her rides.