Those with 2 horses...

It doesn't really matter how much you earn as it depends on your overall expenditure - I rented a flat, worked full time and just managed to afford one. I now live back at home and afforded two through working 15hrs p/w (uni student so couldn't work full time).
 
Hmm, do you know I actually don't really know! We (me, my sister and my mum) have 5 in total but we have our own land so my sister and I pay my mum a certain amount amount to cover feed/farriery etc. I insure my old pony and my youngster (think that'll be about £300 ish a year) but that's really about it. I work full time 9 to 5, 5 days a week and in winter it's a bit of a pain as we don't have a school so I basically can only ride at weekends (and am essentially just a sh* shovelling slave to my horse the rest of the week! lol).

I actually don't think i would be able to afford a horse at all if i had to pay for it to be on livery to be honest. I am not sure how people do afford it!
 
2 of mine live out 24/7, both good doers - cobs. We own the land so costs nothing, just there worming/trims.
The other is at livery so £50 PW, plus shoes etc....

I work to pay for my mare, self employed.
OH takes care of bills etc and we are lucky that we have very little out goings.
 
We have 9, livery is about 550ish, I work part time as we have 3 children, oh works. I do most of the work with them. We love it, would not change it for the world.
 
I dont think it matters how much you earn really, its how you keep your horses. If you want two stables, both on the most expensive shavings, with loss of use insurance, lessons, groom services etc etc. Two will cost you a fortune. I have my two, one is stabled, one is kept at grass.

I pay £186 a month for the stable and a field big ebough for two horses. (about 3 acres) Thats ad lib hay for both of them too.

On top of that i pay for a full set of shoes for my boy every 6 weeks £69 and my mare has her feet trimmed every 12 weeks £20. Insurance is £40 a month for both of them. I have a lesson when i can afford it too :) So just over £300 a month for mine :) And theyre both happy as hell :)
 
in the winter i pay £120 to livery my two. I put all the yard to bet 2x a week to make my rent cheaper. They have ad lib hay/haylage. some haylage is included in the cost, i buy my own hay for my mare. They are barefoot so £40 every 6 weeks for a trim. I spend about £50 a month on supplements and feed. Mine are out 24/7 in the summer so the cost is abit less. i seem to spend more on vehicles! i have a car for work etc which i have on finance and a disco for pulling the horses! I live at home though as im still at uni so i dont have bills.
 
Costs me £16 a week d.I.y livery for two, then obviously £35 for fronts on my mare and £15 for a trim on my old boy every 6/7 weeks. We have roughly 10 acres to our self and my old boy is laminitic so needs very little, so no on top feeding is required! I do consider myself very lucky!! Also have 2 huge stables and tack/feed room at £4 extra a week. :)
 
It's how much you spend on them rather than what you earn IMO. We have three but they're kept at home so costs are minimal - around £1500 per year for them all. When we were on grass livery and had to buy in hay (we now grow our own) we were paying twice that. If they had to be on part/full livery we couldn't afford all three! :)
 
Two good do-oers on grass livery - £300 put aside a month (including winter hay, shoeing, insurance, boosters, dental etc). At the end of the year that leaves around £500 to go to a savings jar for ponies :)

That's also being generous with hard feed (if required).
 
I have had two but now one! Looking for another riding horse.

In past I have rented a field £15 a week for as many as I like to keep(but its only 2.5 acres).

At the moment I dont pay rent but maintain a 3 acre field ie top(£40)/hedge every other year(£70)/mend any fencing or damage we cause. I own a small 2 acre field that is my own and has a shelter and small barn to store hay.Thats it. Have BHS Gold £59 per year that covers public liability of any horse I ride. Do not insure old boy anymore for vets so would have to pay any bills. But it was like running a cheap car when I did. If i get new horse I will insure if young enough.

Live out 24/7 and do this to keep costs down ie NO bedding etc. Wormers twice year only as I poo pick daily(£16) non branded. Living out 24/7 saves an awful lot of money. No expensive feeds a few pony nuts if needed in winter, cheap salt/mineral lick/ few brushes/hoof pick/shoes now off (£50 a set) but now trim only £20. I did have teeth done this year £40 but I dont have it done religiously.

Dont I sound cheap!
 
Well we have a household income of nearly 60K (OH and myself) and I have two horses and we are broke! Make of that what you will. And it isn't like we go on holiday or anything either :D

I reckon mine cost me at least 5 grand a year (there are two of them a TB and a TBXWB)
and that's without competing. I'm looking to buy a trailer next month and then it'll go up another level

Both of them are insured so that's £100 a month, livery is £80 a month each, farrier for two, haylage in winter is £120 a month, they both need hard feed too, she is mucky so uses a couple of bags of wood pellets every week. They are probably quite cosseted and I could do it for less if I didn't have ridiculous bad doers.

In winter he'll eat through a bag of calm and condition and half a sack of alfa a oil as well as sugar beet.

I think I might have to go and cry now!!
 
I was paying 15 per week 5 years ago for one diy then she went lame and I worked out that i was better off buying own land putting up stables etc if I wanted 2 - the extra on the mortgage worked out at less than livery for 2 ! and they can live out most of time so less hay -watch out though it does escalate - first the land then the stables then the transport then the arena !! ahhhhhhh cant afford kids now (thats my excuse)
 
The others are right in that its not what you earn,but how much it costs to keep 2. Ihave my own land but one does ok out 24/7 in summer but is total wimp and poor doer in winter so costs far too much in hard feed and bedding never mind almost a bale of hay a day at four quid a bale.the other two live on fresh air and a bale of hay lasts them several days. Factor in vets,insurance, lessons,farrier,new tack and repairs to old tack and if you want to do shows,alot more money and you probably need to allow a couple of hundred pounds per horse most months,show entries alone are ten quid per class where i live never mind cost of running a lorry!
Things can be done cheaper by buying food and bedding in bulk but you need somewhere to store it.
 
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