The horse market is a brand new world right now and nothing will give you a faster reality check on this point than if you are currently trying to sell a horse … like me.  I have a six year old AQHA mare that I would like to find a new home for and to say that she has been a tough sell would be an understatement. 

First things first, let me share with you the relevant background information:

It was early 2006, I had recently finalized my divorce and was determined to find myself again through the pursuit of those things that I was truly passionate about.  Naturally, the first order of business was to find a young horse to start myself.

I purchased Penny as a not-quite-three-year-old for $1,500.00.  While she was on the smaller side at around 14 hands even, she was a pretty girl with wonderful ground manners, nice movement, good bloodlines and a lot of potential.  Her biggest confirmation flaw was (and still is) that she toes out a bit in the front. 

Her original owners had been keeping her at their place in a smaller pen surrounded by a variety of other critters, and with four (by my count) young boys running around, did not have the time to dedicate to starting a young a horse – a project that I had both the time and the desire to take on.

After a considerable amount of ground work, she started her under saddle that summer.  She was a quick study and ridiculously accepting of every new experience though she has a tendancy to be a little lazy.  Her most annoying habit is a complete lack of respect for my personal space, a problem I attribute to spending too much of her formative years as a family pet with little in the way of discipline. 

Unfortunately, as these things sometimes go I never felt like I had that “connection” with Penny, she wasn’t that true partner that I had hoped she would be.

In the spring of 2008, we made our big move to southwest New Mexico when the Cowboy accepted his current position as the ranch manager for a small commercial and registered Hereford cow-calf operation.  Given my lack of “connection” with Penny and at a mature height of about 14.1 hands and an extremely delicate build left her not so much suited for day-to-day ranch work, we decided we would sell her after we got settled.

Almost, the moment we finished unpacking boxes, Penny came down with a terrible parasite infection that caused her to drop allot of weight very quickly which put any plans for sale on hold.  Our vet easily diagnosed the problem and successfully treated her, but after about six weeks she just wasn’t putting any weight back on.  The vet returned a couple of times and took blood – she was dehydrated and anemic so we had her on an iron supplement and some other medication along with daily “hydro-therapy treatments” – or spraying the puffy spots with cool water to massage them.

On July 5^th the Cowboy finally figured out what was causing all the problems when he went to feed and discovered a new born foal in Penny’s pen.  To our knowledge Penny had never been exposed to a stallion and we assumed her lack of cycling was due to the weight loss from the parasitic infection.  (I have pictures of her from the night before she foaled and you would be hard pressed to tell there was a foal coming in a matter of hours!)  Unfortunately, we had some unsavory neighbors where we were living before, with a constant flow of different horses coming in and out of the adjacent pasture.  Our best guess is that this new foal was a clever “joke.”  (This of course is the topic of another post entirely!)

Obviously this new development would set back any sale plans at least several months.  Once we weaned the foal (who has grown up to be a healthy little bay colt), Penny packed on the pounds and was back to a healthy weight and her perky self by the spring of 2009.  By this point she had had quite a bit of time off and needed a refresher course to be truly marketable, especially in the time of a severe economic downturn.

As I now had found my dream horse in addition to working with another one of the ranch’s new colts, I paid a trainer to put 30-days on Penny and get her back into a working mindset.  I listed her for sale at $2,250.00 in July of 2009, had dropped the asking price to $1,250.00 by November, and to date have received only one inquiry. 

Which brings me to today.

In a time when it’s not uncommon to hear of good/moderate quality riding horses with papers selling at auction for $100.00 (or less) … how do you find your horse a good home without taking a seriously painful monetary hit?

Thus, I created this “Tough Sale Series” of posts to share with you the process of finding Penny a great home while being an honest seller and hopefully not losing my @$$.  Over the next few weeks I’ll review the well known and not-so-well known horse selling tips and through my trials and tribulations and hopefully with your input, inspiration and comments – share in this learning experience of selling a horse in a tough market. 

Below are the quick and dirty facts about this little mare as well as a couple of pictures and videos of her from this summer.  Let me know what you think – comments, questions, faults, suggestions – consider this a case study!  Are you with me?

Penny’s Quick Fact Sheet
Registered Name:  Skipa Little Gata
Age: 6
Breed: Quarter Horse
Registry: AQHA (Click here to see Pedigree)
Sex:  Mare
Height: 14.1
Weight: ~1,000
Color: Bay

This is Penny and her foal … we named him “Peso.”

Both of these videos were done prior to her 30-day refresher with a trainer.

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