Making offers when buying a horse?

legyield

legyield

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I've never bought a horse before although have full loaned/shared in the past.
I'm going to see (another!) horse on Wednesday who looks like an ideal project. He is a 16.3hh grey thoroughbred, advertised for £1250ono with tack and 1 rug. Speaking to his owner tonight, he umm-ed and aah-ed over an offer from a dealer, unseen, for £750 last week but said no as he wanted the horse to go and "do something" rather than go to a dealer.
How do i actually negotiate with the owner? In person at the viewing? Over the phone? How much can i knock off the asking price realistically?

Silly questions really but i've never done it before!
 
If you like the horse and it comes with tack and rug, why try and beat him down, as you may find you will be paying over £700 for new tack and rugs??
 
If you like the horse, its always worth making an offer, if they decline and you like the horse enough to pay the full asking price then fine. If you don't ask, you don't get imho. I bought mine for £2650, he was advertised for £3250
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I always make a low offer to gauge the reaction. I always go to see the horse and take a friend for a second opinion and then sleep on it before making an offer.
The little Cob I bought 2 years ago for my mum was advertised at £2500 and I offered the lady £800 as that is what I genuinely believed her to be worth and said the offer stands for one week and calmly left it at that - the wait was agony but she phoned me after a week and we settled on £1000 all in tack, rugs etc.
But saying that Beatrice was £750 and I loved her immediately and slapped a healthy deposit in the ladies hand before we left the yard although my friend and I did discuss this quietly before I did it. I didn't think I could haggle her down as in my opinion this was dirt cheap and I asked myself what aren't they telling me
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I did insure her straight away just in case there was a nasty suprise lurking but so far she has been perfect.- apart from the suprise foal
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Depends if they are open to offers. I would never make an offer generally on a horse unless it stated the price and "ono" after it or something. People have tried to knock me down on price for horses I've sold in the past and TBH I find it offensive and time wasting (they normally try to do it after they've ridden my horse etc. - if they'd said at the beginning then I would have told them the price is fixed as is obvious by the advert!). Make sure you find out why its going so cheap though!
 
Playing Devil's advocate to Magic Magpie here - but I'd take it the other way round. I actually WOULD make an offer on a horse (assuming that I was genuinely interested in it) even if "ono" wasn't on the ad, UNLESS the ad. specifically stated "NO OFFERS".

However, if the "no offers" horse was the right one for me and was worth the money asked, then I'd still be prepared to pay the full price.
 
I always make offers!

I have turned round to someone and told them I wouldnt buy there horse as I thought it was overpriced before, and they have sold it to me for what I think it is worth!!!

TBH I would question whether a tb is the right horse for a first horse, and why so cheap? I dont want you to run into problems. We all have horses to enjoy them and really consider whether a project is the best thing for your first ned?
 
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