Farm House Hacking

[Stephanie Bureau]

So I'm working on doing some wholesaling for my first couple of deals, but long term we want to do buy and hold rentals. I know house hacking is a good way to get started, but we have 4 dogs (mainly large dogs) and a horse and there's no way we could live in town (I am trying to sell the horse). Has anyone house hacked a working farm? We're in San Antonio so most people want to be in town, but there are quite a few large ranches outside so there might be a market as well as a rodeo that goes from March-November in the small town just north of us in Bulverde, Texas. Is this even something I should consider or probably just a dead-end?

[Tanya H.]

I live in Colorado and have horses and dogs.  I've done both - rented out horse property to others, and rented horse property from others.  And I've done both in the last 10 years or so - all because of the crazy market here in Colorado.  So I've got a few experiences to share and my perspectives.

First, my experience of renting out my horse property to another.  I rented it to an equine vet.  He was going thru a rather ugly divorce.  His credit was not the best, due to the divorce, but he was an established vet in the area.  We actually did a lease-to-own.  He totally trashed the place and decided not to exercise his option.  I guess I was lucky that we were under a lease-to-own agreement, because I got to keep the option amount, the damage deposit, and all those extra $ on to of the monthly rent, but what a mess.  He was there for 2 years.  He literally did not clean a stall the entire time he was there.  Truly sad that his own horses were standing in such filth.  When I took the property back, there was over a foot of PACKED manure in the stalls (I'm not exaggerating - it was packed from wall to wall, and I even had rubber mats in the stalls).  Just one example of how bad it was.  Even though I'm one, I think many horse people are just plain crazy.

Second - my experiences of renting horse properties.  I have to say that I'm very appreciative of the fact that other people are willing to rent out horse properties.  We were in between selling (the above mentioned property) and looking for the right opportunity to buy my next primary home (horse) property.  It was so difficult to find horse property to rent.  We ended up in a couple of really nice places, and we were careful to care for the property as our own.  Both owners remarked how unusual that was for them.

I, personally, would never own rental horse property again.  If you go that route, I would suggest a lease that spells out absolutely everything.  Seriously, horse people are a special breed, and I think many just have way different values than non-horse people, and not necessarily in a good way.

Feel free to PM me if you have any further questions!