To vet or not to vet?

[Skhosu]

So when looking at the potential horses, there are a couple an hour and a half away, a couple less than a grand and a couple around 2 grand.
If buying a horse to play round on, do a bit of everything, bring on and possibly sell would you vet? Thinking about maybe just heart, lungs and eyes?

 

[fjudge]

I would reccomend it

Not talking a 5* but would definately have some sort of check over x

 

[flynn]

would defiently recommened as been caught out a few times

 

[Blizzard]

Maybe just a 2 stage to check for any obivous concerns, unless you are going to be selling the horse on for a lot of money, in which case people will probably want a 5 stage when they buy from you, so may be worth having one in that instance.

 

[RobinHood]

I think under £3000 if there wasn;'t anything I had identified as a particular problem then I would have a 2 stage and then over £3000 I would have a 5 stage. Mind you if you are buying to sell then it would save a lot of embarrassment if you had the horse 5 stage vetted when you bought it.

 

[Toby_Zaphod]

Unless you are absolutely sure on what you are looking at & how to interpret various signs & symptoms you may see, then I would advise vetting. I think it is false econony not to. Wether you are spending £1,500 or £7,000, if the horse has a problem you have still lost potentially more money than a vetting would have cost.

 

[miniemy]

I think the key word there is potential.

For what I would want then I would always 5*.

To buy and sell on then 5*

Dunno I would always 5* really but then I havent got money to buy another if anything went wrong with the one I bought.

 

[AmyMay]

[ QUOTE ]
Thinking about maybe just heart, lungs and eyes?

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes, that's probably what I'd go for.

 

[miller]

Personally would go 5* with any purchase (as long as it was old enough) seen too many stung people

 

[Chex]

Yep, me too. Doesn't matter if the horse only costs a grand, the vets fees are still the same price!

 

[treacle_beastie]

This is a very interesting argument - I see a lot of 2 stage and 5 stage vets report in my line of work and I can honestly say that the 5 stage vets report only really seem to identify things such as cracked feet, unshod behind, sarcoids, old scar, capped hocks, pigeon toes etc - the kind of things you can probably notice yourself if you have enough experience of horses. I would always go with a 2 stage though as you wouldn't be able to tell if a horse had a respiratory or heart problem which may develop further. If you get a 5 stage done and it has a lot of minor coments on it then it may put some people off but on the other hand it may put their minds at rest and buy it for more money! Don't forget though that most insurance companies ask for a 5 stage above £3K or £5K. A 5 stage is good for pickiing up lameness issues though which is probably the most common vets fee claim made through undiagnosed lameness.