Can someone explain horse boarding like I'm completely ignorant?

One thing to consider is that no matter how hands off they are, there will be liability for goings-on on their property. They’d have to look into insurance.

Yes, it is 100% possible to lease the space to an existing business/farm manager/etc. and that is 100% the way to go.

They DO NOT want to get into the business of boarding horses themselves.

They will need to have insurance, they should require insurance from whoever leases the space AND they should speak with an attorney to write up a lease agreement, hold harmless, etc.

The biggest thing, in either case is liability insurance. I don’t know that you wouldn’t need special insurance for horse related stuff. You’d also want to contact a lawyer who knows equine law, as opposed to a regular lawyer and ask what you need to be covered. Things like them signing a contact that they understand horses are dangerous animals and by participating in horse related activities they resolve you guys of any liability if they get hurt.

I don’t think you have enough pasture for boarding a lot or horses. It takes roughly 3 acres per horse to not have to feed them in the summer. In a boarding situation, they usually put out more. They’ll have them stalled for part of the time and out part of the time, so you’re rotating horses on it. Ideally, horses are out 24/7, but that’s what boarding places do.

Even then, you couldn’t use both at the same time. You need to rotate horses on and off of them or you’ll just have two dirt patches.

So sustainably, you’re looking at 2-4 horses without ruining those fields.

You’d have to hire a barn manager to manage farriers, vets, boarder contracts and issues with them. If a boarder causes issues with their horses fighting, or the people’s behavioral issues, it’s a problem. You’ll want a contract that’s iron clad in being able to kick a boarder out.

Honestly, for me, the biggest pro of event space over horses is that it’s a scheduled time for when people will be on your property. With boarding, you’ll have people in and out all the time. They may bring their friends and family who know nothing about horse or have issues. There have been stories on here of a boarders bad kid trying to poison one of the horses. Of people doing things with others horses and even riding them without permission.

With events, you still need the liability insurance for any “slip and fall” artists. It’ll be a lot more controlled though, and when it’s done, they’re gone.

Whatever you choose, put in a lot of security cameras. Invest in good ones, and ones that basically record 24/7. Don’t cheap out on them, because they’ll save your bacon when someone tries to sue you over something stupid.

Yes. Lots of people would jump at this chance.

Your family members need an umbrella policy, a good contract, and to require the leassee to carry insurance as well as follow basic safety guidelines like helmets.

There is no money in boarding horses. Some people do it as a hobby, some people do it to break even while the land appreciates, some people do it as a tax dodge to make their horse expenses a taxable loss. And I suppose some people do it as an attempt at a profitable business because they are delusional.

By all means, investigate renting the place to somebody else to try. If they run a lesson program or a horse training or sale business along side boarding they might be viable.

As landlord though, bear in mind that horses and humans are tough on the place. Are you or the tenant repairing the pastures, fences, stalls and driveways that inevitably get worn down? Renting it is not a bad idea, but without strong contracts you are likely getting it back in significantly degraded condition, or spending a lot of time and money maintaining it.

Definitely look at leasing it out to a legit horse trainer with active clients. I can think of several things I’d personally rather do than run a boarding stable…let’s see…

1. Nail horseshoes to the bottoms of my feet.
   
2. Kick a sleeping tiger in the family jewels and try to outrun him.
   
3. Fill my shirt full of fish and jump into a tank of hungry sea lions.

The hard part is tying them on their backs. Once you have them tied, take a large beach towel and place it over the horse’s head. I take a 5 gallon gas dispenser and fill it with water. Before all of this, I make a list of questions, such as:

1. Why did you bite my ass when I cinched up your saddle?
2. Why did you knock down the last rail of the last jump at this weekend’s show?
3. Where did you put the halter I hung on the gate?

If they don’t talk, more serious interrogation methods may need to be used.

The place I work with boards their horses. It's $475 a month per horse stall. This includes putting down straw (that we pay for) and daily feedings of hay. Any supplemental feed is the duty of the horse owners.

Stalls go up in price depending on amount of space, and nature of the horse (a few hands had been hospitalized trying to take an Arabian out to clean his stall, and one woman was training a horse and he broke away from her and busted her lip).

Sheds have to be bought by the horse owners, and maintained for insurance purposes. They have all sorts of tools on the property for the hands, including some kind of tractor to drag the arenas for use.

There's roughly 200 horses on the property. $95,000 per month, minimum. There's three owners and five or six hands and two guys that work on/with the tractors. $1.1 million gross.

They should sell the property and cash out. Invest the funds or use it to fund a business they care about. Being a venue is also a whole bag of dicks and not something to undertake unless you really want it

I've seen several trainers rent out barns for months, paying less and less or none at all, just wearing out the facilities. Horses, in general, are accident-prone and casually destructive. Just owning property and carrying liability is expensive, and a lot of insurance companies right now are hurting from all the natural disasters. Horse barns make great event centers, but that comes with similar issues of respect and liability, little bit more flexibility because they don't have to have people there 24/7.

I hope they don’t turn it into something else, it’s devastating how many actual horse places are going under the knife. 🥺 But, no way should someone without experience jump into boarding, it’s a nightmare and you would need a very experienced person to run things and you’ll most likely just lose money. I second the others suggestion— lease it to a vetted trainer and have an Iron Clad contract

Honestly, it's almost definitely going to be a massive impact on their "quite enjoyment" of the property.

People expect near 24/7 access to their horses, arriving at ungodly hours to go to shows, up all night with sick or injured horses, and they're almost guaranteed to be called upon in emergencies.

If they don't have any experience with horses it could go wrong pretty quickly. One thing I've observed over the years is that unless a boarding stables is very closely and quite strictly managed (aka ruled with an iron fist, which I'm sure many people on this thread will have experienced for better or worse!) Horse people will likely just walk all over them.. it could turn into chaos very quickly..

That being said with the right trainer/ manager to lease it they could make a fair bit of money in theory, however horses do have a tendency to bleed you dry and equestrian property upkeep costs a lot of money, it definitely isn't a "set and forget " type scenario!

If it's a beautiful property, and the outbuildings are quaint and well built it could be a really nice function venue. Show rings make great car parks/ marquee areas. Throw a few ponies and farm animals about the place and it could be a great draw card for weddings etc if you're in an in demand area.

After I stopped riding my parents turned down so many people who wanted to board purely because they hated the thought of people hanging around the whole time treating it like their second home. They agreed to a couple of retired horses for a friend that were low maintenance and made nice "paddock ornaments" as we call them.

And to add, 2 x 5 acre paddocks won't service 20 stables. You would likely need to split them into at least 20 x half acre paddocks, which need rotation, a lot of high quality fencing, automatic watering, not to mention that many horses in such proximity to each other would almost certainly result in many fence related injuries when they all muck about trying to play/ fight etc. Horses can't really stay in stables 24/7 and a scenario where they are all turned out together in the 2 existing paddocks (one for mares, one for geldings) would be pretty rare. Maybe for school horses if it's just a lesson barn as opposed to self board.

Urgh I'm tired even thinking about it.. horses are a round the clock job essentially.. and they eat money and shit out bills..

My two cents! Proceed with caution!!

Renting the space opens them up to different types of liability, I would advise against taking in boarders if they want to remain hands off.

Yes there is a way for them to lease it for a trainer / existing business, and get insurance up the wazoo for liability, responsibility, etc.

By a trainer I mean a true professional who runs a training program.

Have a lawyer draw it up for you and be truly airtight on insurance & liability.

Do NOT try to run a boarding facility on your own at all.

The way to do this is 100% lease it to a trainer

Might I suggest something considerably less dangerous if your family won’t be involved. Lease it out to someone raising chickens or goats or something.

I swear, horses are not suicidal or homicidal but they are basically rabbits which weigh 800 pounds and it feels as if they are trying to invent new ways to die or murder people.

As a horse person, and a professional working in the wedding industry, they will both be nightmares. But you’re better off with it being an event venue. Probably more money, and you can have managers do most of the planning and organization for you.

It’d be easier and more profitable to use it as an events place.

Or speak with a real estate person/attorney to rent out to someone to operate a boarding facility instead of themselves. They (your family) would need insurance and whoever is renting would need insurance.

Also, unless the person renting from your family is able to live on site, your family will still be involved and liable for the animals there. (If they get loose, shady characters, damages, emergencies, storms and evacuation, etc)

Yes, you can advertise barn, pasture available to trainer or barn manager for X monthly self care with option to sublet to boarders.

Be sure to have signs posted for liability AND make sure all sublets sign release waivers to protect you from legalities.

Sounds like they're unaware of horse boarding and horse ownership in general, so honestly I'd recommend they avoid that. Which is a shame because so many barns are closing down, people just can't afford to own property anymore, and the ones that can are so old now they physically can't do it anymore.

Leasing to a trainer is a decent idea, honestly, if that's an option. But not a lot of trainers out there who don't already have their set up currently. I think it would be worth researching your area on this. For example, if they're located in Ocala, Columbus, certain areas of TX, etc, it would be a huge market for something like that. But if you're in the middle of nowhere, perhaps not.

And unfortunately we don't need any more money hungry "venues" and it sounds like it'd be a waste of space like this, but they'll make a stupid amount of money doing that.

People are saying contact lawyers, but my first step would be to contact several insurance agents and see what their quotes are, what they cover, and ask them all the "what ifs" questions you have.

Your insurance has to cover damage to the people, objects, and horses from your property: flooded tack room and all their saddles ruined? Fence broke and all the horses escaped and damaged neighboring property? Building collapse and totaled their trailers and trucks?

Trainers would have their own insurance, but you're better off (and I think it's required? unsure) to have your own policy as property owner.

Just know, someone can sue you for a splinter and your rate is going to sky rocket lol.

My family had a boarding stable on our property when I was a kid - middle school to high school. I would never do it. No matter how hands off you are, things WILL happen that require you to be involved. Things will break, waterlines will flood, waterlines will freeze, horses will go through fences, horses will get sick and the trainer won't be able to be there and someone will have to be.

Having a boarding stable also means people coming and going from your property all the time. You can have posted hours and I guarantee you that some people will not respect that. We had boarder show up in the middle of the night to take nighttime rides while they were drunk, we had people smoking in the stalls, we had people not show up and not take care of their horses and then we had to take care of them, people bring in personal belongings that are very expensive and those things could get stolen or damaged.

On top of that you have the day-to-day running of a stable which includes feeding, watering, mucking out, putting on blankets and taking off blankets, turning horses out, dealing with horses that get sick, the list goes on and on. And someone needs to manage all of that and if your trainer doesn't it still falls back to you because it's your property And the horses are in your backyard.

And the next thing to know about a boarding stable is that horses will do everything in their power to try and hurt and/or kill themselves. They will eat too much, they will run through fences, they will spook at the stupidest things, they will eat the stupidest things, they will fight with each other even if they have always gotten along Previously. And when a horse gets hurt someone has to take care of it, someone has to wait for the vet, someone has to hold the horse for the vet, someone has to pay the vet. Again that should be the person who owns the horse or the trainer, ask me how often I was up in the middle of the night walking a sick horse waiting for a vet because the owner couldn't be bothered to show up.

If horses aren't your passion, a boarding stable makes no sense

You also need a way to get rid of/spread all the manure.

Someone has probably already said this, but it will be far better to sell this property for what its worth and take the profit. Horse boarding facilities are closing left and right because its not sustainable unless you are catering to the top earning horse owners/showers. It’s not worth your time and effort if you aren’t already a horse person.