Farm Hunters: Would You Buy or Rent This Property? Part Two

Yesterday, I wrote about my cousin and his potential investment in a horse property. He wanted to know if it was a good horse property, and in particular whether it was realistic to lease out the barn + pasture to a horse owner in the area.

Here's what I told him.

- At 1.32 acres, and only .75 acres fenced in, it's extremely small as a horse property. The pasture would always be a dry lot, and manure removal would be constant. Soil remediation would be necessary on a semi-regular basis.
- If he were to find someone to lease the barn, he'd have to write up a fairly strong contract and I'd help him work on that, but it would have to include things like who's calling the vet, what their obligations are as owners/lessors, who's responsible for what maintenance, and he'd probably have to provide a space for trailer parking.
- I ballparked a guess at $100/month per horse for the lease, based on what I knew of the area and what he was offering. I gave him the information for the tack shop, where he could both advertise the space and get good local market advice.
- In short, he'd have to be really careful at screening whoever he got, if he could get anyone interested. I explained to him in the strongest possible terms that horse people are crazy, and that he'd have to be prepared for that. He's a longtime landlord, but I said to him, no, think way crazier.
- I also told him that I was far from an expert, but he'd have to seriously explore changing or increasing his homeowner's and/or liability insurance with all possible contingencies covered.
- That said, I DO think he'd find someone to lease it.

In conclusion, however: I don't think the time, expense, and worry would be worth it unless everything worked out perfectly, and, well, horses. No such thing as working out perfectly. I advised him against leasing the barn and pasture out on a longterm basis.

However, here's what I think has real potential: I think this could be a really ideal rehab or short-term situation. If he made the right contacts at the tack store (and actually I'd be happy to do that for him, as it's an awesome tack store with good people) he could be in a great place to provide a space for someone whose horse needed 3 months of inexpensive stall rest, or limited turnout, or someone who was in a bad place and loved their horse but needed a place to put them for a month or two.

The absolute least hassle solution is simply to maintain the barn, pasture, and fence. Use the barn as storage - and as a real estate guy, he's always got a ton of extra stuff that's going in and out of new apartments - and spend some real quality time remediating the pasture, planting good grass to revitalize the turf. Keep it looking sharp, and yeah, down the road, someone probably would buy it as a horse property.

How do you think I did? Agree, disagree?

See, I wasn't just whining: coldest winter EVER.

I would just like to leave this here, as evidence that I am not simply a whiner who can't cope with winter. While Boston was getting record snowfall, Vermont experienced literally the coldest winter in recorded history. I have never sacrificed so many riding days to the extreme cold.

From Eye on the Sky, our local non-hysterical and actually-meteorological weather guys:

The February 2015 Summary: 

This was one of the coldest months on record for several stations. 

For Burlington, it was the 3rd coldest February, and the 7th coldest of any month, with an average of 7.6°F. 

In St. Johnsbury, this was the 2nd coldest February, and ties the 6th coldest month, with an average of 7.7°F. 

In addition, this was the coldest January-February period since 1904, and includes 41 days (so far) with temperatures consecutively at 32°F or colder, the second longest stretch at the Museum (the longest, 51 days, ran from late December 1976 through early February 1977) 

This is the only February on the Museum records with no above freezing temperatures.
Southern areas also received heavy snowfall, with 45.6 inches reported in Marlboro, VT, and Hillsboro Upper Village, NH had 56.5 inches. 

To get an idea how extraordinary the cold was, the image shows the average February temperature in St. Johnsbury since 1895 (the dark blue line), with the red line a 7-year running mean to show a trend over the years. It is only the 2nd February to average less than 10°F since 1934. This was NOT just an "old-fashioned" February!

They do not report on my area, but did in a previous post: my city averaged 4°F for the month of February, which was officially its coldest ever.

Farm Hunters: Would You Buy or Rent This Property? Part One

Not for me - sorry! Our own house/farm search is continuing apace, and I hope to have an update soon. In the meantime, I present to you this quandary.

I have a cousin who has an extraordinary head for business. He's been pursuing various lines of moneymaking since we were kids. He works incredibly hard at his very lucrative day job, and in his spare time is always looking for investments. Lately, he's been doing a lot of real estate. I think he's up to four or five rental properties. He does the work himself to make them nice and he's a really thorough landlord.

Last week, he called me for my opinion on a property he's looking at purchasing - for himself, this time. It's a foreclosure in a semi-rural area but still quite close to the Boston metropolitan area. The house is huge and gorgeous, but what he called me for my opinion on is the horse potential of the property. He has zero interest in horses himself - well, at this point in his life he does, anyway. When we were kids we totally had a plan to adopt a black mustang stallion named Midnight and keep it behind my house and have adventures together. But I digress.

What he was wondering was whether it would make sense to lease out the barn and pasture to someone who wanted to keep their own horses there. So, here's what I'll do: I'll set up the situation as he described it to me, and as I've researched it on my own, and I'll ask you what you would choose. Tomorrow, I'll write up what I advised him.

The basics: The entire property, house + barn + pasture, is 1.32 acres. Approximately .75 acres of that is fenced with high-quality board fencing that has been well-maintained. The 2 stall barn (visible in this picture) was built in 2008 and has an overhang, hay loft, tack/grain room area. There is electricity and running cold water in the barn, which opens to the pasture. The previous owners kept two horses on the property.

The surroundings: The lot is on a slight incline, but nothing too dramatic. Most of the pasture is flattish. Soil quality appears to be pretty decent, with good drainage. The lot is a corner one on a larger, but not too busy, road. The town itself is VERY horsey; one of the better tack shops for 50 miles is within 10 minutes, and there are multiple state parks and conservation areas with extensive trail systems in the town itself, with quite a bit more accessible just a little further away.

There is significant land across the street, and it connects to the trail systems of one of the largest parks. However, there is an open question of whether there are any right-of-way paths through that land, or whether it is private and posted against trespassing. 

So, with all of that in mind: would you lease the barn + pasture for your own horses, for self-care board? Would you buy this property someday as a horse owner? What would you recommend he do if he were to buy this property?

Getting Back in Shape

I checked the forecast for this week and I don't mean to alarm anyone but it might hit 20 degrees. On one day, it might hit 37. 37!!!!!!!!! I have actual literal tears in my eyes, tears of joy, at the idea of feeling the warmth of a 37 degree day.

(All of you in sunny climates can stop snickering now.)

So, I have a horse who has not been ridden in any real, substantial way for two months. Whenever I can I would go out and ride, but that amounted to once, maybe twice, on really rare occasions three times a week. Followed by a week of nothing. Lather, rinse, repeat. On such an intermittent schedule, I couldn't get anything really significant done for risk of injury; full blast then back to sedentary does not a sound, happy horse make.

So: walking. When I could. That's been about it. He's been turned out, obviously, and in snow, but he's also been eating his head off on free-choice hay to try and stay warm.

I've been reading and thinking about our back-to-work plan. I want to ride, really ride, all summer, none of this back and forth crap. I want a fit horse that can do canter sets. I want him to have a proper topline again. He was doing so well late this fall and earlier in the winter!

Here are a couple of good things I've been reading:

Bringing a Horse Back Into Work from Equisearch
Our Guidelines for Bringing a Horse Back Into Work from Grey Horse Matters
How long to go from winter flab to eventing fab? from COTH Forums

Do you have a horse emergency kit in the car?

A recent post on A Filly's Best Friend about catching loose horses got me thinking about a similar incident in my own life about 10 years ago. I was driving to my barn in a not-terribly-rural part of Vermont, and a horse came out of what seemed like nowhere to gallop in front of my car. I slammed on the brakes, pulled over, and luckily the horse was so wigged out by everything he came right to me. I grabbed his halter with my hand and led him over to the nearby barn that I knew he'd come from. They had only just realized he was gone and were relieved and grateful.

A few days later, I bought a cheap nylon halter and an extra cotton lead rope and added them to my car's emergency kit. I keep a few basic supplies in a milk crate in my trunk at all times: a jug of water, extra windshield wiper fluid, a quart of oil, jumper cables, some old hand towels, a human first aid kit, an extra winter hat and gloves, and some reflective blankets. I added the halter and lead rope to it. Of course, now that I'm prepared, I've never since needed it.

But reading that post got me to thinking: should I add to that kit? Maybe some gauze and vetwrap? I've posted before about my fairly obsessive trailering first aid kit, and I'm wondering if that needs to be expanded.

Do you keep any horse rescuing supplies in your car at all times? What kinds of things do you have?