Headshaker wont sell -opinions

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hollylane_mikal1

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Hey all

My best friend is trying to sell her warmblood gelding. Hes a stunning horse, but needs a lot of work otherwise he gets bored and chews everything in sight! So he needs to be kept in constant work to keep his brain ticking over.

he had a vetting a few weeks ago and failed on his head shaking and the fact he has a cateract in his eye (left I think) but this hasn't caused him any problems.

He can jump, hack, done a little cross country but he isnt a fan of ditches.

Now, shes having problems selling him and she needs to sell him quite quickly (he was out on loan but had him given back to her unexpectidly just before christmas)

What sort of price would you expect to pay for him? (hes up for £1,400 including full wardrobe) And does anyone else have any other ideas ( I have ridden him myself and can safely say this horse is in no way shape or form a danger) Hes just a slight head shaker.

Ideas/opinions welcome

thanks all
 
As a hunter? no headshaking in winter turned out in summer or does he headshake all year round as most seem to be affected by sunlight in summer
 
I'm sure one day when the right person comes along, actually tries him, see's him at his worst (with the headshaking, even if its just slight as you say) trials him then he will sell. I will admit that yes, knowing he as this condition with his eye and being a headshaker will unfortunately put people off but you have to disclose all information, so at least your friend is being honest and doing the right thing by her horse. Is there no way she can put him on loan again? selling him on cheaper may lead to him being sold and passed around if people are not as honest as your friend, specially if he is a flashy looking chap and a good jumper, or if people don't understand how he needs to be managed (regally in work as you said).
Good safe horses are not easy to come by, so if he is good to hack out on his own, will cope fine with local RC activities being it jumping, bit of dressage and he is not hindered in anyway by the the headshaking or his eye then I personally wouldn't overlook him if I was looking for something of that sort, my other cob was a headshake but he made up for it in all other areas, he was a god sent of horse and I sold him no problem with the buyer knowing he was a headshaker during certain times of the year, they have no problems with him, use a nose net and everything is hunky dory.

The issue here is....can you give a horse a lot of work that suffers from headshaking? yes you exercise them everyday but strenuous work or faster work is not possible, in fact it can be impossible, headshakers depending on how bad they are, baring in mind it alters from year to to year, can't possibly do fast work, because the more you pick up speed the more air they take in, the more irritated and painful it becomes and the more head tossing they do, so it depends on the type of work your friends horse needs to keep him on an even balance if you see what I mean.

Hope she finds a good home for the fella.
smile.gif
 
Seems a reasonable price, but people are incredibly wary about buying a headshaker, as there is the chance he will get worse (not saying he will, but people worry about that). You don't say how old he is. That is an important factor in how much to ask...Also he effectively has got only got one good eye which reduces his value as can make jumping tricky, you have to be more considerate as to how you present them to the fence etc. Interestingly a one-eyed pony in our PC would never go near ditches either - maybe they can't judge them well enough?

Could try 'leasing' him ie loaning with small fee, so that people feel they could give him back if he got worse. If that happened she would have to decide if he was still able to be ridden.
 
He needs to be under 1k and then she will be inundated with people so long as she is open and honest about his problems.
 
If she reduces the price to say £1000, she could always not include the wardrobe in the price - a bit of a psychological thing really, it 'feels' the horse is cheaper than £1400 but she could well get the extra £400 for his clothes IYSWIM.
 
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