Selling/showing property with animals

[Heinz_57]

While not currently on the market, we are planning to sell next spring/summer and it got me wondering - what do you do/have done when selling property that has animals on it? Presumably, prospective buyers will want to see the land or fencing and the barn.

Our particular set up has a stall with in/out access to the pasture, so I have the ability to either lock the horse in or out. I worry about gates being closed and latched properly and do not want people messing with my horse. He is fairly anti-social and will not generally come up to people in the pasture, however he will reach out if in the barn. The whole of the property is visible from the fence line, and there is hot wire all the way around.

Maybe the best solution is to just board the horse temporarily? The property is small enough that it will be of interest to non-horse people, and is not big enough to be of interest to someone who owns a whole herd. It would be easily convertible to garden/farm/small animal uses. So there is likely to be people who are not horse-savvy wandering around.

[Foxglove]

This topic was on the BB a while ago --might be able to find it. Our Realtor persisted in asking us to remove all animals and signs of animal occupation. No dog dishes, no shavings in stalls, no cat boxes, nothing that suggested an animal ever lived on the place. It took us almost a year of NOT selling our small farm to listen to her advice. Then we boarded the horses, and when the house was shown, all cats and dogs and any sign of same were removed. To look at our place, you’d never think an animal had ever lived there.

It sold two weeks later to a family who wanted to use the stable for their teenage sons to work on their cars.

Realtor’s point was that buyers need to be able to “see” their dreams --not be distracted by yours --had the barn been occupied by horses or signs of same, buyer might have thought --“I don’t need a stable, I need a garage!” But by removing EVERYTHING horse related, he could see the 36x40 building as a garage for his kids’ cars.

As to the house pets --believe it or not, some people are put off at the thought of a dog or cat living in a house --the way you or I might be creeped out by someone who kept pet snakes or rats or bats in the house. (No offence, just creepy).

And, honestly, if you were given a choice, would you stay in the hotel room set aside for guests WITH PETS or prefer the room set aside for guests without pets? I love MY dog, but I don’t want to sleep in a room where YOURS has been.

Anyway --We ended up selling our small farm and buying a bigger one where the stable HAD been used as a paint shop for cars --LOL! They’d taken the stalls out --but they had saved all the lumber. I was able to rebuild the stalls for my horses. On the other hand, if it had been a set-up working paint shop when I saw it (instead of an empty building) I might not have recognized the potential!

Move your critters!

[ElementFarm]

For places that can be multi-purposed, I see Foxglove’s point.

when we were farm shopping, most of the places had horses living there.
I would remove clutter, have barn meticulously clean and tidy, pastures mowed/maintained, and fencing repaired. But I wanted to walk the perimeters, and the previous owner’s horses didn’t bother us. I would remove dogs and cats from the house, since you don’t want barking or risk of someone accidently let out.

but I live in horse country, and so horse farms are generally being bought by other horse owners. No need to appeal to car junkies, etc.

[Heinz_57]

The dogs will be a whole 'nother ball of wax, and I can see the headaches coming already. I won’t leave them in the house, but I’ll have to figure out what I’m going to do with two large dogs and an infant while the house is being shown. We don’t have any indoor cats, just a barn cat, but we also have chickens and goats that I can’t just get rid of. Pets really don’t bother me personally and I bought the place knowing a dog lived there - sellers were in the home when it was shown. I have a GSD and a border collie, hair and dirt are just a way of life, but I get that it could deter some people.

IF I can convince the hubby that we need to board the horse come spring, would it be better or worse to just remove all fencing instead of replacing it? Right now we’ve got a mishmash of old bent up no climb, hot wire, and who knows what else that needs to come out. The barn would be relatively easy to revert back to a pole barn/shop structure, thankfully.

Small acreage in this area is a rarity and very desirable, most everything else available is either a postage stamp lot in a subdivision or large tracts of farmland that are very pricey.

[js]

Which is why we decided to buy our next place prior to actually putting our current place on the market. A tricky thing to do but with 13 cats, 4 horses and 1 dog, impossible to remove all animals and evidence of animals every time the house needs to be shown. Me and the animals will move to the new place while DH gets our place painted, new carpet and cleaned to sell it. Fortunately we have no mortgage on this place so will only have the new place mortgage which hopefully most will be paid for once current place sells.

[candyappy]

We have multiple farm animals and there is no way I would move them out for the duration of my places being on the market. What you do is make sure your realtor rechecks all gates they happen to go through.

I did request the people not go into animal living areas for their own safety. Our barns were set up that they could go into each one and get a good look of the set up and condition w/o having to be in the animals area too.

When showing the house I took our dogs with me when I left the property before the lookers arrived. I also cleaned up the house every morning and kept the barns clean in case of a unscheduled showing.

[StarPattern]

I, too, had to figure out what to do with my dogs while my house is on the market. Luckily, my boyfriend and I have separate houses and he has already agreed to let my dogs move in with him while we try to sell my house. Anything dog related will go to his house and I will live between two houses.

As for fencing, I’d say remove the wire but leave the posts. My boyfriend got a kick out of how excited I got when I saw fence posts. “But babe… it’s just posts. There’s no actual fencing.”

He didn’t know that the posts were the hardest and most expensive part of fencing and couldn’t understand why I was so thrilled about it. After I explained the process of post pounding, he understood a little bit better.

[Color_of_Light]

Opposite experience: when we first saw the farm, there were over 150 farm animals on it, lots of farm junk, fences that were not horse safe and needed torn down, animal shelters we couldn’t use…and a dirty huge Standard Poodle. This was not a scheduled showing, no realtor was present. We toured all of the property and saw it for what it was (gorgeous land with lots of potential). Based on that one showing, we purchased the place, then went to town tearing things down, remodeling barns, building arenas and more barns.

If I was selling, I couldn’t move horses first. I’d make sure the barns were immacculate and probably put horses in pastures or dry lots. Dogs would be removed for the day.

[tpup]

Realtor here I am Northern VA and farm animals are almost always on the property unless the seller has already moved to new place. With an infant and 2 dogs, you could go outside/take a walk or unfortunately you’ll probably be driving around during showings. IMO the dogs can be more of a deterrent than the farm animals so it is really best for them to not be in the home when buyers come. Since acreage is desired where you are, I have a feeling many who look at your property will want animals themselves. Your agent should note your listing as “notice required - pets” and she or you should screen the showing calls either by phone or via an online services that texts or emails and you the seller must approve the showing. If you expect an influx of traffic the first week or two (or weekends) perhaps boarding the dogs is an option. I sometimes recommend that in a hotter market as we know the first week or two will have a lot of showings. Remember that no matter what you do, you can still get idiots coming unannounced, drive-by’s. If that gets bad use an “appt. only” rider on the sign. You can also ask showing agents to pls. text you when they are done at the house since you do have an infant and it’s winter and you don’t want to drive around for a 2 hour window if they are in and out in the first half hour. Not all will do it but it’s worth asking especially if you take the showing appt. calls. For the barn and horses I’d leave signs on all the gates you are worried about or add showing instructions to listing “do not open gates” or “close all gates”. Good luck!

[SugarCubes]

I recently posted a similar thread. Our house has been on the market for a couple of weeks now, we have two horses and two dogs on the property. When we’ve had showings, I clean stalls and paddocks right before the appointment and make sure the barn is absolutely gleaming (horses included). I also have in/out stalls and I let the horses have access to both their stall and paddocks during showings. Our realtor made a note for other agents to keep all doors and gates shut and we haven’t had any issues so far. I have an open stall so people can walk inside and see that the stalls are matted with fans, etc, without having to go in any area occupied by a horse.

As for the dogs, I just take them with me during showings. I don’t hide beds or bowls, mainly because we have a built-in “dog room” by our garage and everything is in there, and anyone who saw that room would know it was for dogs!

I wish we were able to buy a new place before selling this one, it would make things a LOT easier, but it is definitely doable. Good Luck!!

[Jealoushe]

I just sold my farm and the horses were turned out when I had viewings. My dogs on the other hand I just locked in the tack room and told the realtor to tell them they can see it another time if they are truly interested (its a pretty ghetto tack room not much to see). This worked pretty well. When they did the inspection, I locked the dogs in a stall.

[Libby2563]

[QUOTE=Heinz 57;8955053]
Our particular set up has a stall with in/out access to the pasture, so I have the ability to either lock the horse in or out. I worry about gates being closed and latched properly and do not want people messing with my horse. He is fairly anti-social and will not generally come up to people in the pasture, however he will reach out if in the barn. The whole of the property is visible from the fence line, and there is hot wire all the way around.[/QUOTE]

I totally understand your concerns here. I would feel the same way.

Are there any gates that potential buyers should not be going through anyway? Like gates into the pasture or perimeter gates for tractor access, etc. If so, I would buy a few combination locks and chain those shut. It only takes a few seconds for you to open, but it will prevent the realtor or buyers from leaving them open by accident. You could even chain the horse’s stall door closed (not something I would normally recommend for safety reasons, but since he has in/out access I think it would be fine). I have these locks on my back pasture gate and the gate to my barn driveway. I’ve been using them for 3.5 years and they hold up really well in the outdoors, no rust or anything.

Then if someone was a serious buyer and wanted to come back for a close-up inspection of the pasture, fence, stall interior, etc you could arrange to be there for that.

If you don’t already have signs up warning of the electric fence, add those and that should help keep people off the horse fence. You could even add a dummy strand of something that looks hot but isn’t.

[Simkie]

When we had the house on the market, I took the house animals with me for showings. Dog beds and litter boxes were put away. We didn’t remove ALL signs of pets but we definitely minimized, especially in the main living areas.

Horses were left out in the field, stalls and runs were clean. Had the house been on the market for any length of time, I would have padlocked them into a field with only one gate for showings. As it was, we only had to show it for two days, and my agent made sure to speak with the buyer agents about not hassling horses and leaving all gates as they were found.

When we were shopping, our agent handled ALL gates, which I appreciated. I sure didn’t want to be responsible for leaving something open or closing something that should be open or breaking something by opening it. Worked great.

[Heinz_57]

[QUOTE=Libby2563;8956404]
I totally understand your concerns here. I would feel the same way.

Are there any gates that potential buyers should not be going through anyway? Like gates into the pasture or perimeter gates for tractor access, etc. If so, I would buy a few combination locks and chain those shut. It only takes a few seconds for you to open, but it will prevent the realtor or buyers from leaving them open by accident. You could even chain the horse’s stall door closed (not something I would normally recommend for safety reasons, but since he has in/out access I think it would be fine). I have these locks on my back pasture gate and the gate to my barn driveway. I’ve been using them for 3.5 years and they hold up really well in the outdoors, no rust or anything.

Then if someone was a serious buyer and wanted to come back for a close-up inspection of the pasture, fence, stall interior, etc you could arrange to be there for that.

If you don’t already have signs up warning of the electric fence, add those and that should help keep people off the horse fence. You could even add a dummy strand of something that looks hot but isn’t.[/QUOTE]

There is one gate that is generally open between the stall and pasture, that can only be accessed via the stall. There is another gate along the long side of the pasture that can only be accessed from the neighbor’s side of the fence (was there when we bought and serves no purpose), a man gate from the back yard into the pasture, and a hotwire gate halfway between the man gate and the barn (used primarily for truck/tractor access as needed). The stall setup is just a half wall and I can’t fathom why anyone would need to actually go into the stall - it’s a small barn, single stall - but you never know. So he can reach over for nose pets and treats if he’s inside.

I plan to use a horse-friendly realtor so she should know to remind buyers’ agents not to bother the animals. My biggest concerns are my horse accidentally getting out or someone trying to feed him and getting chomped on. He doesn’t bite, but we all know how non-horsey people seem to have a knack for shoving their fingers into even the gentlest mouths. And he’s a nightmare to catch if he gets loose. The last time it happened, I chased him around the neighbor’s 60 acres for nearly 3 hours before he finally put himself back in his own field (I think mostly because at that point I was using words like “dog food” and “glue factory” under my breath).

Thanks for all the input, guys. Definitely lots to consider before we put the place up.

[Simkie]

You can request that your realtor be present for showings, too, if that would give you more peace of mind. In some areas it’s actually standard, but you can ask for it anywhere.

[Coop79221]

We just put our farm on the market a week ago. We have several farm animals. I opted to stay on the property during every showing. I station myself in the barn next to the stalls and make sure the animals are secure in the barn stalls during showings. My agent made sure to put in bold capital letters within the agent notes to NOT TOUCH THE ANIMALS. All set right? NOPE! Every single showing that came through for a week now has put their hands and arms through gates and into the stalls, arms reaching over stall walls to touch the animals. Every. single. person. The agents said nothing. I was so shocked that at first I didn’t say anything. By the third time I had to verbally tell everyone please do not touch the animals and I was met with disgusted looks in my own barn with my own animals. We were treated like a petting zoo. We finally had to put up orange tape blocking off vulnerable spots and hanging multiple
Signs all over the stalls and gates. We even had to place a huge A-frame sign directly next to the barn door as people entered. I can only imagine what would occur if I was not there during showings

[S1969]

I know this is an old thread but recently sold my farm. I moved my last remaining horse before I put my farm on the market and am glad I did. Still had 3 dogs in a kennel though.

About 60% of the showings left at least one gate open and some left the exterior kennel door open too. Talk about heart failure, coming home to that. Of course there were interior kennel doors too but we use both for a reason.

Always check your gates and potentially consider locking them if you’re away during a showing.