I’m Selling My Horse Stuff

I’m Selling My Horse Stuff

I have been a budget equestrian for as long as I have had horses. When I was a teenager, this was because I didn’t have any money. And when I was a young mother, I still didn’t have any money. And now that my babies are grown, and my husband and I are empty nesters, we have a lot more use of the money we have.

So now that I am able to buy what I want for my horses, and their care I can honestly say, a lot of the expensive horse stuff isn’t really necessary. Well, at least not for me. But I can say that now because I have bought all the fancy stuff, and it didn’t make any difference. What made the difference is actually getting out to ride and work with my horses!

So Much Stuff

I will admit that I got sucked into the hype of needing to have expensive tack. I thought if it it was expensive, it must mean it’s better, right? But honestly as long as you get what you need, that is what matters. And I find I am just as happy riding in the $300.00 Wintec saddle at my lessons, as I am riding in my more expensive saddle at home.

So I have decided to purge all of the horse stuff that I have, and don’t ever use. I spent the entire day Saturday of going through a lot of my excess horse stuff. I cleaned it, photographed it, and creating listings for eBay. And this was no easy task. What I thought would take me a few hours ended up taking all day. And I’m not even finished! I was organizing my tack room and going through drawers and found even more stuff that had never been used!

It’s Hard To Let Go

And when I sat down to clean each item I found myself thinking maybe I shouldn’t sell this stuff. It looked so pretty being clean, and I love horse stuff no matter what it is. But I refrained. I stuck to it and got 55 items listed for sale. But I did wrestle with my inner self. I would rationalize why I should keep all this equipment. My sensible self chimed in and reminded me of how I was spending the first nice Saturday in many months, I was cleaning horse tack that I rarely use. I was sad, but at the same time, I felt relief.

Now I will have less stuff to look at when I am in the barn. I will have more time to ride Ethan and groom Frisby instead of taking care of 15 bridles, and 3 saddles. I mean I can only use 1 saddle and bridle at a time, unless my husband and I go on a trail ride together, then I will need two saddles and two bridles. But 95% of the time, I need one of each.

Sticking To My Plan

And because I really do want to get rid of this stuff, I have to mean it. And to really let it go, I have to set a low price to entice people to buy my sh#$! So that’s what I did. Most of the items I have listed right now have very low opening bid prices. And I have to be ok with this because they are out there now, and the highest bidder wins. On the more expensive items I have, I didn’t want them to go for like $5.00. Like my saddle, MDC stirrups, or Ogilvy half pad, so I did price those accordingly. They are still a good deal, but sorry, you won’t be getting my custom Ogilvy pad for $20 bucks.

Since it took my all day to get 55 auctions listed, I was going to spend today getting the rest of the items I have for sale. But I think 55 auctions is something I can reasonably handle. And after the auctions end next Monday, I will take the rest of the things I have and schedule them to begin the following Saturday. So maybe I will have an updated post to share with you how it went, as well as alerting you to the potential deal you may be able to get on something you may need for your horse.

 

No More Excess

Once all this stuff is gone, I am vowing to myself to never repeat the process.  If there is something that I feel I really must have, then I need to figure out why I need to have it. And I will take it one step further, if I want the new thing so bad, I will have to get rid of two things, to buy the one new thing.

And it is a pain in the butt to get stuff ready to sell on eBay. Hopefully I will remember what I had to do yesterday and how I wasted a beautiful riding day because I had to sell a bunch of stuff. If that shiny new toy means that much to me, I will have to do the work before I get the toy.

 

Buy My Stuff

If you are looking for a shiny new toy and want to see what I have listed for sale on eBay, you can follow this link to see what I have available. At the time this post goes live, everything should be up and ready for you to bid on. I am replacing my saddle with a more sensible saddle that makes sense for me and Ethan. So the proceeds from these auctions will be going to fund that purchase. And the rest of the money will go to pay off my credit cards, which was what I used to buy all of this stuff in the first place.

And if I have any money left over, I think I will use that to fund my weekly riding lessons. Because that is knowledge that I can build upon. And also write about here, and share my new found knowledge with you!

So just one more shameless plug for my eBay auctions, go check them out here!