New reports offer a fresh perspective on horse expenses
By Karen Hopper Usher | The Horse
We’re all just one emergency away from facing serious trouble. It was a sobering realization for Heather Hayes, owner and trainer of Cozy Fields Farm, in Ellington, Connecticut, as she considered the financial strains of running a horse business.
In September 2021 Hayes sat down with her accountant. Her boarding rates would need to go up. Post-COVID inflation saw her costs climbing (they still are) and, even though the rate increase she made was relatively small ($50/month), a client had some questions.
Hayes turned to Facebook, breaking down costs and writing, “at $500-$600 a month, your barn owner is breaking even or operating at a loss,” when trying to cover all the costs of running a farm (from hay to electricity to insurance to labor). She concluded by writing, “I fear that by the time my kids are grown, only the wealthy will have horses.”
Since then her words have been shared at least 10,000 times. Hayes already had broad contacts in the horse industry. In addition to her training board, sales, and lesson programs, Hayes offers bodywork services and travels to other farms in New England. The Facebook post, however, went even further.
“It was a real wake-up call for me because you know how it is in this industry. Nobody likes to admit that it’s hard and it’s scary,” Hayes says. But people started telling her they were operating in the red. It wasn’t just the small operations. The big properties with immaculate facilities and reputations for doing a lot of business were saying the same thing. “I was like, ‘You’re somebody who I strive to be like. And we’re in the same situation.’”
Horse owners tend to do some magical thinking when it comes to money. We underestimate how much we’re already spending. One recent study completed by Synchrony noted horse owners spend three to four times more than they initially estimate.
In 2023 Synchrony published the CareCredit “Equine Lifetime of Care Study,” which offers a look at lifetime costs of horse ownership as well as horse-owner attitudes toward their horse-related spending, while aiming to help people plan for the unexpected.
Results from the study showed 83% of horse owners feel prepared for unexpected expenses, while 85% feel stress about their horse-related expenditures.
The horse world is intensely varied, however. Our expenses and our horses are individual. Circumstances, regions, and more affect how much we spend.
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