Making a Profit with Animals

We currently rent a place in the country where we have been allowed to raise chickens, but are ever under the watchful and critical eye of the landowner. He has another piece of land he wishes to sell, rent-to-own, or rent if the first two options don't happen, just up the road. It is ten acres, has a couple of fields, 14 stall horse barn with arena, and older house. However, the cost would be considerably more than we pay here. The problem - husband who works 8 days of every 14 up north thinks we can make up the difference ($1000 per month) raising, selling, butchering, boarding various animals. I disagree, seeing how much work and money even 50 or so chickens is. What is the opinion of people here? Is there an animal that does make a good return on investment? I don't mind being wrong in my opinion that raising animals is high cost up front, a lot of work, and is not going to provide regular income. Any thoughts or discussion would be helpful, though there is no guarantee he will listen. I certainly appreciate the thoughts of the people on this board on many of the various topics that come up.

Animals will not provide the consistant income you need every month. If you had an outbreak of ILT in say, your broiler flocks you would be wiped out.

If you need an extra $1000 a month for a new place and the $1000 is for rent or mortgage...something that MUST be paid without fail every month, sickness or other problems in your animals would break you.

Depending on your location a horse boarding facility would be your best bet, would be a constant income each month, as long as you have a place convenient for horse people, and nice enough for them as well.
Any type of livestock is always a high and low time in the year. We try to raise different animals so that the income is spread out through the year.
I raise chicks/hatching eggs for the spring income, lambs for the summer income and calves for the fall income. Winter is the most limited and cost causing because of caring for animals that are not making money at that time and higher costs to house/feed/keep them warm.
But if your arena at the other place is nice enough you could charge out to have people ride there in the winter time?

One good thing about our set up is my hubby works off the farm and his paychecks cover all we need each month, the other we sell covers the cost to raise them and also a bit of spending money in our pockets. When you are depending on it all to cover your costs each month it does get a little trickier...

Any time you add other people + animals, it's a recipe for disaster.

I have a friend who boards horses. On a good month, she makes enough to cover the costs of keeping her own horses. On a bad month, she's losing money. Arenas and barns are a HUGE expense in terms of overhead - electricity, heat, water, maintenance, INSURANCE. (Horse people are CRAZY. You will need insurance.) You're not looking at a $1000 difference between your rent and the potential new rent - you're looking at a much bigger number once you add in the overhead expenses.

10 acres isn't enough to make a go at anything that might be profitable without having to deal with humans - ie. cattle production, crop production.

Personally - and this is backed up by a diploma in Equine Business Management and over a decade of running my own businesses - I think that you're unlikely to be able to make up that additional money each month by doing anything with animals.

This is going to sound awful..but anytime animals HAVE to be your source of income, the care those animals receive goes downhill. Once a critter is your income, unless it's on a quotaed scale (like a dairy) they are just another number. Soon you realize you can shave a few dollars off a month if you cut back on their feed. Or go to a cheaper brand of feed. Or when a piece of equipment breaks instead of replace it you 'make do', and the animal in some way lives without sufficient heat or water or fencing...because to repair and replace takes more time and effort than the animal is bringing in. Or you know you need the vet but gee, you are reluctant to call the vet because of the $100 call out fee...maybe they can go just a few more weeks without worming or...you know what I mean.

I am not saying this is what you'd do. BUt today was talking to a man who is friends with a lady who raises dogs. She raises dogs to make money. SHe has LOTS of dogs kept in REPULSIVE conditions and this man goes to her place and shoots 10 or 12 dogs at a time when she gets too many. At least she's not letting them starve. But when animals are dollar signs, unless you are set up for it from the get go, it rarely goes well for the animal.

Have you thought about non- animal things you can do to make up the extra money? Storing trailers? Garden plots? ???

I think the ideal way to make extra money is to do something you enjoy, that takes very few raw materials, especially expensive raw materials, and will give you a big return on your investment and time. In your case you also need regular income as well.

uno wrote:This is going to sound awful..but anytime animals HAVE to be your source of income, the care those animals receive goes downhill.

I didn't want to say this previously but Uno is right. Now before you jump on her...note the boldfaced "HAVE to" in her post.

Give or take, we're breaking even if my math is correct, and that's with a mixed flock/herd of destructive goats and ramshackle chickens.

I disagree that 10acres isn't enough. Intensively managed it's MORE than enough. It's getting set up that's the issue. Be very careful though, I agree. You cannot rely on raising and so on animals for your income until you're well settled in and set up.

I have to agree with Uno and Sue, as I so often do.

If you raise chickens, you need a consistent market for the product, timed for sales of it (eggs or meat) and consistent feed that isn't going to change dramatically from year-to-year.  If you're boarding horses and providing hay, are you prepared to make your own?  Do you have equipment?  What if there's a drought or flood and there's no hay available or you can't make your own?  You don't make much $$ off self-boarding.  

If you raise any kind of animals I think you have to take the fluctuation of feed prices into account, or even the scarcity of it sometimes, as this does happen.

I agree 10 acres is lots, but how much do you want to kill yourself to get that acreage?

I live on an acreage and have a full time job.  I have had to downsize my animals because it's just too damn much work!  I don't have a man around the place, or even just that crucial second set of hands, anyone's hands, to do needed repairs or cut the grass when I have to go away for work.  I think a horse operation, complete with arena and pens or stalls, would be an enormous amount of work that I'm not equipped to do myself, so if you're like me, you'd have to ask your husband to either pay for someone to help you out, or be able to come home in an emergency, say like when the well pump dies and your boarders have no water...

I think a person can find a nice property within their means that doesn't need all the extra income just to be able to support living there.  This place started out as an older house on a bare acreage (except for a shed).  Now it's more, but I don't use much because as I said, I downsized.

Good luck with your process, and if you ever do come across something that you determine is a sure thing, please share with us what it is!!  

Thanks for all your replies. It agrees totally with what I think. I believe he just has fuzzy memories of farms when he was a kid, and since he isn't here much, has no idea how much work and money even a few chickens are. His job would cover the rent and maybe some of the utilities, depending on how much they are. But the rent-to-own payment is out of reach without extra income. I think he feels desperate because we are renting this place, and the owner's children who want the place some day unexpectedly decided to move to a trailer also on the farm we currently live at when it was recently vacated. So our time here may be limited, and we really don't know if we will be able to find another affordable acreage if we are given notice (which should give us six months to look), and it would be so hard to give up the chickens to move back to town, if that turns out to be the only option when the time comes. A lot of ifs and maybes, as you can see. I wish it were as easy as he seems to think - but he is a dreamer, which has gotten us nowhere but in debt, and I am a realist, which has kept us afloat.

At one time you used to be able to make some funds with a horse boarding facility, now, with all the demands of people and overhead costs (power, heat, insurance, maintenance ect) you may cover the costs if you are lucky!! I agree, if you want to rely on animals to earn extra income, I just don't think it will happen, if you figure out a way, please share it with the rest of us!! Lol

Not sure about making money using a small scale model.

If you figure out how, you should write a book. I'd buy one.  

Fowler wrote:

If you figure out how, you should write a book.  I'd buy one.   

Me too. That'd probably be your money maker right there.

It's my idea! I thought of it first!

HOW TO MAKE A PROFIT RAISING ANIMALS

Chapter One; Page 1;

"Write a book on how to make a profit raising animals..."

^ Exactly! You're going to be riiiiiiiiiich, rich I tell ya! But why stop at a book? You need to think BIGGER, you need to travel from city to city hosting get rich quick off animals seminars for the masses.