Buying a house with land, keeping horse at home.

We have about 2.5 acres for horse purposes at home and another 1/2 acre for the house/garden. 2 acres split into 2 fields. On clay so very wet in the winter but only tends to get to fetlock deep and is slushy. Half the field is on gravel as its down by the river so that bit stays dry. I turn big horse out all year round, during the winter season - during the day and summer - 24 7.

Up at the house is the yard - an open fronted barn with 2 stables in and the third bay is bricked up as a workshop for OH. Stables open out onto large concrete area which I use as a turn out yard for big horse and I leave his stable door open at night so he can wander about. Little paddock up at the house for pony. It is doable and in the summer we have too much grass. In the winter, things get muddy!!! But we cope and I love having the horses at home.
 
I think that one acre would be fine for up to two horses so long as you have an all weather turnout area and are prepared to feed hay all year round. If you want to turn out on grass all year round then you'd need a lot more land. I would say four acres for two equines. But if you could get planning for either hard standing or a sand turnout area, then I'd go for it!
 
yeah theres a huge difference between a house on an acre and a house 'with' an extra acre. And the shape of the site and access gates and driveways makes a huge difference
 
I called the estate agents to try and glean a little more information. The advert is misleading, it says 1 acre paddock. In fact, 1 acre includes the house and an parking area (you can fit 7 cars apparently!). I also drove past the house yesterday and had a nosey, of course they photography it to make it look bigger than it is and this was no exception, land also a very funny shape around the property. I think we might cancel the viewing, I think it will be a waste of our time and theirs. :(
 
LHIS said:
I called the estate agents to try and glean a little more information. The advert is misleading, it says 1 acre paddock. In fact, 1 acre includes the house and an parking area (you can fit 7 cars apparently!). I also drove past the house yesterday and had a nosey, of course they photography it to make it look bigger than it is and this was no exception, land also a very funny shape around the property. I think we might cancel the viewing, I think it will be a waste of our time and theirs. :(
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This is just the start unfortunately :( Cancel, there is no point viewing if you are looking for land. Photos are good BUT room measurements and floor plans showing sq ft are more important. These photos they take shouldnt be allowed they can be so misleading! ... apart from the photos of our place, yes the garden is that bloody big!!! :(
 
be positive said:
Do you mean the house has an agricultural tie on it? if so you will struggle to get a mortgage regardless of whether the land is enough to keep a pony on it, an acre is tiny if it is inclusive of the house, any driveway and you must keep some garden around the house so before you build anything else you would already be well under 1 acre and you would also have to get planning for an arena which may not be as easy as you would hope.
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I don't know if this has been said already because I haven't read on yet, but no planning consent is required to put an arena in a garden. I have two friends who have both done it.

Apologies of this is a repeat.
 
ycbm said:
I don't know if this has been said already because I haven't read on yet, but no planning consent is required to put an arena in a garden. I have two friends who have both done it.

Apologies of this is a repeat.
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You are correct, stables can also be erected in a garden without pp, it was the land being described as agricultural that made me think pp may be required, if it is legally garden then you can build, if it is supposed to be agricultural land then it should not have been turned into garden without pp, it depends how picky the LA is but it seems that the OP has found out there really isn't enough land anyway.
 
I'd be tempted to go for a nosey anyway, it's good to see as many properties as you can to "get your eye in" and know what you don't want as well as what you do. We had 2 "house with land for the horses" hunts 3 years apart, first time in Forest of Dean/welsh borders, almost bought a 5 acre property but it fell through just before exchange which was devestating but in retrospect a good thing as our circumstances changed soon after. Then 2 years ago we bought a run down bungalow and 3 acres and tons of outbuildings/stables (mostly very run down/falling down) on clay. We have slogged non stop for 2 years, and spent every bean and then some, and are still not properly fenced, We have 4 wooden stables with a new roof we did ourselves, and 6 brick ones with leaky asbestos or metal rooves. The fields are level and sheltered and electric fencing keeps my 2 horses where they should be.
The jewel in the crown, and the only way this property is able to sustain 2 horses (why are there TEN stables????) is a 20 x 20 all weather area straight off the large stable yard - the horses have the lot, yard, open stables, turnout - once the clay fields get too wet, and stay in that area all winter, eating their way through £££ of hay.
So even with 3 acres, it's tough, and expensive, and hard work to manage. But hey, I'm finally living the dream, and I don't regret our decision at all, except maybe the fact that I haven't had a holiday in 2 years nor likely to!
 
I've just bought land like yourself it was smaller than I'd dreamt about but it means it's much more manageable. It has a field shelter, a 1/3 acre paddock and another 1/3 area of red chips.
We are currently doing up the house just now and turning the shelter into stables. I will be creating a 15x15m area of hard standing/winter turnout. The other red chip area will be made into another paddock.

I have a highland who is prone weight gain and lami and will be getting a little fatty companion. So the limited grazing doesn't bother me :)
Its a real dream come true and ideal for me but perhaps of you wanted 2 16.2h&h for 24/7 turnout it wouldn't work.

All The best!!!
 
I'm a new landowner as well! We have 2.8 acres and currently 2 horses, but I think we could have up to 4 on what we have- the caveat being that grass and everything else grows like crazy on our rich soil, AND it sits on sand about 1.5 feet down so the drainage is fabulous. That said our small field is looking a bit rough as it's been raining and they've been playing and skidding on it tearing up some of the grass. But we haven't even touched the larger field yet (I'm saving that for winter!).

LAND IS A LOT OF DAMN WORK. I've spent the last two weekends prepping for winter by digging out 6" deep to put lining and gravel into stable doorways, gates and about to do the areas around the water trough to ward off "potential mud". We routinely strim the edges of the hedge and fence, yank out weeds at least once a week, flatten mole hills, removed the toxic plants (which luckily you only have to do once), and are planning to let the horses tear the **** out of both fields this winter so I can re-seed with a non-rye blend to reduce the chances of laminitis. We have a muck heap we will be removing in the spring, and I find having a field shelter with free access really cuts down on the volume of muck because while we poo-pick daily, the horses mostly poo/wee in the field so it's not a ton of bedding going in to the heap! I'm also very lucky with our field footing in that I'm not hard-pressed to hire an arena to do basic flatwork and jumping- setting stuff in the field is working well for me until I have a trailer to go to a proper school and get back to lessons.

Make friends with nearby equestrian centers or other horse keepers- you never know if they'd be willing to share hay/bedding deliveries with you. As a smaller operation things will get more expensive because you'll be storage limited and bulk buying can get tough toward the middle/end of winter. (In fact, I'm just now pricing expanding the hay storage capabilities for this reason.)

It's a little hard, because while doing all these projects I got to ride maybe once a week at the start. We were building the portable field shelter and fences and stuff. It sucks when it's dark and rainy and you still have to trudge out and muck/feed because no one else is there to do it for you. I'm lucky that I have a few local friends to ride with, but it can get a bit lonely and I do miss the social aspect of livery. I find I don't save as much money as I thought, and having to shop for hay and bedding and organize delivery and payment is an inconvenience I'm not terribly fond of sometimes. (An intangible you tend to take for granted in livery!)

I think I would go for at least two acres, more if the soil/grounds aren't ideal. And honestly I would "live in it" for a few months before building permanent structures to figure out what work flow works best for you and your little farm. (ie, probably don't want to put the muck heap near the neighbors, but you also want it as far from your stable as possible, etc)

But honestly, despite all the hard work it's a dream come true to look out of my home office window and see my pony playing in our field for the first time in our lives.
 
We're just in the process of buying but looked at loads and loads (and put several offers in so hoping this comes off)! Land type is essential to get right if you're going for a smaller acreage and I'd look at doing an area for hardstanding where you can get them out the box but you'll need to feed hay. Access is important too - deliveries are much easier and cheaper if you have decent access.
 
Honestly an acre wont be enough. I've kept my lot at home 90% of the time (livery years and years ago but have had smallholdings since), we moved off a 20 acre smallholding in spring to a 3.5 acre and I've just had to put my three on livery because 3.5 acres is just not enough.
 
MotherOfChickens said:
I have to disagree with this. sometimes it pays to think outside the box-the place we bought has limited acreage but was a haulage place so had a huge workshop that has a undercover tie up area plus two huge boxes and a storage area. It had offices in a large insulated shed so we had large double doors put in and that is my hay shed, feed store and tack room. In addition it has a really large old tarmac car park that we've turned into a hardstanding area as well as a grass lunging pen on the front lawn. It obviously had no agricultural tie on it though. We have access to 100s of acres of forestry and grazing for hacking and nearest neighbour is a beef/cattle farm half a mile away. I do have to rent additional grazing and I box to local arenas.

Ask about to see if you can rent additional grazing, check out the local area for riding and obvs check out the ag tie.
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I am not saying it can't be done but the few houses we looked at with very limited grazing were not in a particular horse keeping area, the hacking was a fair distance away and the nearby houses didn't have horses so potentially you could be classed as a nuisance to them so I was going by my own experience.
 
I've under 3/4 acre for a 6 year old horse and a 4 year old mini shetland. I can honestly say that both are very happy and chilled. They live together in a turnout area and field shelter and go out or a few hours most days unless the weather is really bad.
Small acreage can work if managed right. Its not ideal but its better than what some horses have. I've spent past few years trying to improve the land, its an ongoing process. At times they have only had 1/3 acre to go out on and they're even happy with that. As long as they can run around and let of steam they don't care. T
 
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