Questions for Buying a Horse

I've been meaning to write this post for awhile, but I lost/misplaced my list of questions until recently, and there was no way I could reproduce them from memory.  (I have attempted to block the whole process of buying a horse from my mind - it was very stressful!)

When I started to look for a horse for Gemma, I put together a handful of questions that I wanted to ask the sellers.  I got feedback from a couple of friends and added a few more, and I borrowed a couple from a post by Bruce Weary on the AERC Facebook page.  What I discovered is that the more sellers I talked to and the more horse ads I looked at, the more questions I was able to come up with.  

What follows below is where I ended up by the time I bought Freya at the auction.  I didn't have a chance to ask every single question then, and I don't know that it ended up being a big deal that I didn't.  It is definitely possible to make some assumptions about a horse based on how it behaves when you interact with it and see it in a new environment.  But I don't think I'm really at the point where I can just sense things about horses the way a lot of more experienced horse shoppers can.  So I wanted to be as comprehensive as I could be.

Anyway, just in case I have a reader who is embarking on some horse shopping, I thought I would share the questions.

1. What can you tell me about the horse?  (This question came from Bruce Weary.  He often buys horses from Craigslist ads, and even sight unseen.  He recommended this question as a way to open the door of communication and get the seller talking.  He pointed out that sometimes a seller will tell you something about the horse that you would have never thought to ask.)

2. What level of rider is the horse best suited for?  (This was the hardest question for me to ask, because a lot of sellers led a conversation by asking me what I was looking for.  That was annoying, and one recommendation I have is to try to get the seller to answer this question before you give away a lot about what you are looking for.  Most sellers are honest, I think, or at least well-intended, but I think it is better to hear the seller's analysis so that they don't skew their answer to make the sale.)

3. How long have you had the horse?  (Even if the owner hasn't had the horse long, sometimes you can track down previous owners or more stuff about the horse on social media.  Never underestimate the power of a hashtag search on Instagram or a name search on Facebook.  It's amazing what you can find.)

4. What is the most dangerous thing the horse has ever done?  (I'm pretty sure this one also came from Bruce, and it is a great question.  For the horses I was looking at, I typically got answers like, the horse sometimes doesn't stand still for mounting or the horse trots kind of fast.)

5. Does the horse have any bad habits, like weaving, cribbing, kicking, biting, etc.?  (If you have a pet peeve horse behavior, make sure you ask about it.  In this area, cribbing is super common, and isn't always disclosed because people are so used to it.  Kicking and biting are also surprisingly common among the performance horses I know at my barn and others, so it's good to know what the horse does.)

6. Does the horse stand tied to a trailer/post/wall?  (I know lots of horses that can be tied to an object or cross-tied, but not both.  Cross-tying is the most common method I see in this area, and lots of people keep their horses in the trailer at shows because they don't stand tied to a trailer.)

7. Does the horse stand in cross-ties?

8. How does the horse lead?  How do you encourage the horse to move forward?  What cues do you use for turning/stopping/backing? (This question and the next one includes getting information on how the horse is asked to do something because I've discovered that it isn't standard.  Lots of natural horsemanship techniques seem to be used, along with the more traditional methods and some horses are very specific about what they need from their handler.)

9. Does the horse load in a trailer?  How do you ask the horse to go in?  What kind of trailers has the horse been in?  How does the horse haul?

10. Where has the horse traveled?  How often?

11. Does the horse stand for grooming, picking feet, farrier, clipping?

12. How do you catch the horse?  (Don't ask if the horse is easy to catch. That is too subjective.  Some people think it is normal to have to wander all over to catch the horse.)

13. Have you trail ridden the horse?  How often? Where?  On what kind of trails?  Are there any obstacles that bother the horse?  (I learned in my endurance days that trail riding is not the same for everyone.  For some people, trail riding is a 30-minute walk around an open field and for others, it is 5 hours of walk/trot/canter over rocky mountain trails.)

14. Have you shown the horse?  In what disciplines?  How often?  Where?  Is there anything the horse is concerned about at shows?

15. What kind of environment is the horse kept in?  (For example, in a field with other horses during the day and stalled at night.)  If the horse is in a pasture, is the horse used to being in a stall?  How does the horse handle being in a stall for several hours?

16. If a mare, what is the mare like when she is in heat?

17. If a gelding, when was the horse gelded?  (I came up with this one after my experience at an auction where I saw a 9-year-old gelding that I learned had only bene gelded at 7. Gelding that late can mean lasting stallion-like behaviors.)

18. Does the horse have any soundness issues now or previously?

19. Does the horse have any medical issues now or previously?

20. What is the horse being fed now?  Any supplements?  Medications?  How often?  And how is the horse fed (e.g. in a stall, in a run-in with a nosebag and other horses, on the ground, in a special bucket)

21. What discipline/style of riding is the horse most commonly used for?  How is the horse to tack up?  What equipment do you use?  (e.g. bit, girth, pad, saddle - some horses have strong preferences)  What other disciplines/styles of riding have you tried with the horse?

22. Has the horse been ridden with other horses, either on a trail or in the arena?  What was the horse's response to horses close to it or moving away/toward it?

23. Has the horse ever been ridden alone?  If yes, how does it behave?

So that is my list of questions.  You could definitely add in some more about pre-purchase exams, trial periods, contract and pricing terms, registration status, discipline/competition-specific, etc., depending on the market and the price point you are looking at.  And some of them can definitely be answered through observation if you get the chance, but in a hot horse market, buyers may have to buy with limited interaction with the horse and no trial period.  So the more information, the better!  And, if a seller seems to hedge on answers or skirt the issue, then that is information you can use too.  

If you have any questions that you have found to be helpful, please feel free to comment with them.  I'm not expecting to buy another horse anytime soon, but I can use all the help I can get the next time!:)