Thinking of opening DIY livery yard, have some questions for you.

[Twattyzombiebollocks]

I'm potentially buying a property with 6 acres and around 10 boxes, I'm planning to have a small private livery yard, the access is very secure with 2 gates, one electric, yard and field not visible at all from the road. Facilities would be night stable/day turnout, rubber matting in boxes, new floodlit arena (possibly a slight surcharge for use of floodlights) spare box for washing/clipping farrier with a proper overhead hose arm. Secure tack room, feed room, hay and bedding storage.
What sort of price am I looking at per week per stable for this? I am planning on being very selective about who comes onto the yard, I won't put up with people stealing feed/hay/equipment, and I won't put up with arguments and bad feeling on the yard, I've been on some lovely well run yards and some nightmares!
What do you look for in a DIY yard, aside from a compulsory worming routine, good fencing, pasture management, clean tidy well maintained yard?

Definitely agree with everyone else re. the grazing issue. 10 horses on 6 acres is well over stocked and your fields will be trashed in no time.

As an e.g, I currently have 8 horses, 2 of which are mini shetlands. So roughly the numbers you'd have for a livery. OK, so it's slightly different in that my horses live out 24/7.

On 1st April, (so roughly 5-6 weeks ago) we moved them into a 3 acre paddock so that they could graze it bald bare for the summer turnout. (They are all very good doers). The ground is very dry, and the paddock had been rested for 9 months with no stock on it through the winter. The field is now grazed bare, with a bare area at the gate, which is exactly what I want so that I have a "fatty" paddock. That paddock will "hopefully" struggle to recover before we bring the horses off in September.

The horses 6 acre winter field that they were on October - April, (so 7 months) was absolutely trashed - as in poached badly around the gates and fence lines, with divots and ruts all over it - and it's the driest field on the farm. 2 of my cob boys were moved out for 4 weeks (so at one point the 6 acre field only had 6 horses & 2 mini shits) and put on to a 1 acre paddock through March, and that small paddock was ruined within 2 weeks as it was so wet.

It's no big deal for us as DH had plans to plough both trashed fields this spring to then reseed them for a horse ley instead of a cattle silage ley anyway, and we have other fields for the horses, but my point is that your fields will be trashed far sooner than you think, even on restricted turnout. If you can't rest them, it'll get to the point where they are useless and you have no turnout.

We have 4 horses on 10 acres. Probably 8 acres are actual grazing, with a large manège and other areas are walkways, parking, stables and a large area for the poo pile and tractor and trailer. I think you need to consider what you are going to do with the massive amount of manure that will be generated. If you are stabling at night, there will be a barrow load at least each day, plus the poo picking from the field. We have to dispose of ours ourselves, as there is no local friendly farmer who wants it. Our horses are all stabled every night of the year, but we turn out, no matter what the weather every day from 7.00 am til sun down. There is sufficient grazing for 4, but any more would be overstocking. We also only have geldings here - we find mares are too disruptive for the boys.

I think the thing that would be a big no no for me is allowing people to come up later 'by arrangement'
People like to be able to see their horses as and when it suits them. Lots of people work, have kids, commute and don't get to see their horses until 7pm. A livery owner who said there were opening hours or I could come up 'by arrangement' wouldn't be a livery owner for long round here.