Advice wanted please.....Yard for rent.

[Beerwench]

Hi, calling on anyone who has done this for some advice ......... Here's the scenario -

There's a yard across the road from me advertised for rent to run as an equine business.
The ad doesn't say what's included (water/electric/rates etc) but we'd find that out on viewing. I'm not sure what the norm is though when renting a full yard to run as your own?

My friend and I have 5 between us but 2 would winter out. There are 6 stables so we would occupy 3, leaving 3 that we could rent out as livery.
We'd do it diy only, but we would offer to turn out/bring in and put haynets in etc on an as and when basis.
Would we be liable for business rates on this? We'd literally just be charging each stable 1/6th of the monthly costs not making any money although ultimately we'd be responsible for paying the full rent to the owner and collecting from the liveries.
What type of insurance would we need to be looking at? I'd like each horse to be insured by the owner but ultimately I know this doesn't always happen, I'd just want to make sure we'd be covered from any liability should something happen.
Anyone any experience of this? We'd love to take the yard and could afford it between us, but would make it easier all round if we had 3 others to come in with us so to speak so we don't have empty stables and would reduce the cost for everyone. I don't particularly want to 'run' a livery yard or business, we'd just help out when others needed it, not offer part or full livery services or anything.

[Beerwench]

Hi all and thanks for the replies. On viewing there isn't enough land for the 6 stables working on an acre per horse, and no turn out at all in winter. We both have turn out where we are and it's really important to both of us that we have 12 month turn out, very lucky to have that and it's a deal breaker.
But thank you for all your replies
Much appreciated.

[BenjaminLinus]

To be honest, unless you really REALLY want to look after other peoples horses, I'd keep it between you and your friend. Perhaps rent out a stable for storage or something easier and less problematic.

[BenjaminLinus]

Phone the NFU for a rough idea - I was quoted about £100 pa to add a single livery onto our farm insurance, we do already pay them a ridiculous amount though, so this was just to cover us incase we broke the pony, not buildings or public liability or anything.

[britnay]

how much land does it have?
You would be liable for business rates per livery stable.
You would also be liable for tax on any services that you charge for (such as doing haynets etc)

[Butkin1]

Not your scenario but we rent a yard and paddocks just for ourselves. As renters the key to us is that we pay a set fee quarterly and it includes electricity and water plus fertilising the fields. We pay for everything else ourselves.

You'd need to check the stables have enough grazing - remembering that paying clients may not want their horses turned out with yours and in the Winter it gets tough with the fields being churned up etc.

Our landlord isn't horsey at all so lets us get on with it (great..). However he does insist we have 2 million pounds worth of insurance as he's obsessed about liability litigation.

If I owned the yard ourselves I'd plumb in hot water - that's the only thing we miss and have a Hot horse Shower to create comfort for our animals !