01/30/2026
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Horse industry : the math is not mathing
I have had a bunch of clients inquiring about horses lately, coming for trials, asking us to arrange shipping and ending up bailing out because they couldn’t afford the board at the place they intended to take the horse to. Or for people to complain because board is now $900 or $1,000 or $1,200 and that it’s insane and the trainers are just price gouging.
So here is the actual break down.
Client math :
Shavings : $150/month
Hay (Florida prices here) at $18/a square small Bale : $270/month (2 to 3 flakes AM/PM)
Grain : $150/month
Barn help salary ($15/hour for 30mn/day) : $225/month
Total : $795
So with a $1,000/board that’s a $205/profit per horse x 20 horses boarded = that’s $4,100 for the barn owner to work all day with horses and have a dream job.
Then clients thinks wait a minute, I will buy my own farm and I will have 2 of my own horses and I will have 8 boarders and the boarders will pay for my horses and I will pay no board. Genius.
Now here is the barn owner math:
All the above and actually more in labor… but for the sake of the discussion let’s keep those numbers
Then comes all the 4 digits invoices that keep on showing up to maintain said farm.
So for me this month at my farm it has been
$1,200 to replace 4 tires on my dually
$1,600 for pads, rotors, brake fluids, alignment and oil change, and DEF on said dually
$500/payment on tractor because my old tractor died last year (RIP Johnny).
$1,200 to buy new rails for the jumps (I bought the last batch 5 years ago).
$160 for a Tire for my Gator
$118 for a new battery for the hydraulic jack of my 2+1 trailer (I know I could buy a crank one and save money but this is the best money spend, I hate cranking)
Those are just extra bills for this month.
But there are more over the past couple of months: Bookkeeper, mowing guy, w**d killer, seeds for the pastures, refill for the fly spray system, motherboard for the sprinkler system to water the ring, sprinkler heads, drain guy company to unglog the pipes because apparently p**p and sand going down the pipe is not productive to good drainage (who knew?), culvert replacement to prevent flooding, loads of road base to fix driveways and potholes, washer (hair and dirt clogs drains)… broken boards, broken stall doors, leaky hose, I could had so many more to this list. It never ends…
I currently have 9 horses at my farm, so with all the bills just from this month each horse would have technically cost me more than $1,325. And I also have more than one person working for me, so my payroll is way higher than the client’s estimate quoted above. At this point I still haven’t paid myself, I haven’t paid my mortgage or rent. Let’s not forget the insurance…
And I’m “lucky” that besides the tractor everything else is paid off (so truck, trailer, gator payments). So if you factor those other expenses ($4,000 mortgage, $1,400 truck payment, $800 trailer payment, $1,300 insurance) so about $835/horse.
So just to cover the running cost of the farm it’s about $2,160/per horse per month with a big fat $0 in the income column for me.
So do me a favor when you write your check for the board this month, do it with a big smile.
If you are considering having a little hobby farm and board a few horses to offset the cost of everything, DON’T DO IT… it’s a trap. There is not such a thing as getting anything free with horses, you will just give the money to the drain guy and the tractor dealership instead of your lovely barn onwer/trainer. And you will need to add a $30 Tylenol maybe a $30 Lexapro budget for all the headaches and anxiety that having a horse farm might induce.
Don’t get me wrong I love my farm and wouldn’t picture any other way to live. But the proceeds of the horses’ sales is what is keeping the dream of a once little 10 year horse crazy girl who dreamed to work with horses alive.
I would like to dearly appologize to my fellow professionals who like me put their head in the sand and pretend that these numbers don’t exist, and again I would like to tell all of you we are boarding to go hug your barn owners/trainers. Well ask them first about the hug thing (I’m personally not a hugger and it can get very awkward and uncomfortable), maybe go for a high five!
