[Riverotter]

South of the Mason Dixon line on a small farm, this seems pretty common to me.
In a barn like that, the aisle is not meant for the horses. The outside overhang is meant for the horses. Anything that you might want to do in the aisle, you do under the overhang. The horses go in and out from the outside, not the aisle.

The aisle is only for you, to feed, to muck, to carry hay. And that is wide enough for a garden size tractor, which is about all you'll need on 10 acres anyway. I have 10 acres, and a full size tractor would make hubby happy, but is not needed at all.

Go look at the place.

[saultgirl]

If that's the only thing wrong with the whole place, count your lucky stars and write the cheque.

You can put up cross ties in a stall (or all of them) to use that space for tacking, and you can get in and out with a wheelbarrow just fine.

A horse can definitely get hurt in a small place if something goes wrong... or in a big place.... or in a perfectly medium-sized place. A horse can get cast up against a fence in a 100 acre field.

[morgansnmind]

My barn aisle is 6ft. It's not so bad. If it's just you and maybe one other boarder it works. I thought I would really really hate it but it's not a big deal really. I cannnot drive anything (maybe a bike LOL) threw it because the doorway is 4 4 1/2ft.

If your horses don't get along then you might want to have full doors (I have half doors but mine are buddies).

[onelanerode]

So we hemmed and hawed and finally decided to go see the place yesterday. Of course it was pouring rain.

House is lovely; it has everything we need and nothing we don't! We would only make one fairly easy/minor change to it before moving in.

So the barn: I said earlier that the stalls were 10x12. Well, I lied (not really, I just *suck* at math and didn't get my dimensions quite right). They are actually 10x10. Sliding doors open into the 6-foot-wide aisle, dutch doors at the back of the stalls. The four stalls are at the four corners of the barn, with two 10x10 bays in the middle across from each other. Barn faces southwest, but is surrounded by pretty big hardwoods (including a pignut hickory whose nuts were dropping onto the metal roof ... sounded like gunshots).

The two stalls on the left open into a small (40x40ish) drylot; the two on the right are currently being used as storage (front one is hay). There are two hayracks bolted to the side of the barn on the drylot side, under the lean-to.

All the stalls have packed gravel bases with shavings on top. There are glass windows in the stalls (one in each stall on the front walls of the barn and the back walls of the barn). Stall walls are rough-cut 2x6 boards; stall fronts look like they might have been kits and have vertical bars starting about 4 feet up. Stall fronts also contain swing-out combo hay/grain feeders.

One bay could be a washstall; hot and cold water are there and so is a drain, but the drain would need a drainpipe to channel the water away from the barn. Current owner has never used it as a wash stall, so drain has been covered. Washstall bay is currently feed/tools; opposite bay is tack and also contains the water filtration system for house and barn apartment.

Drylot opens out into one of three small pastures. That pasture leads to a bigger drylot (~60x80), which is currently being used as a sacrifice area; the horses are fed here, and there are two frost-free hydrants here as well for water. There are two other small pastures that connect to this sacrifice lot.

Fence is four strands of high-tensile on wood posts. It looks to be in good shape. Soil is red clay (no escaping that!) except for the small drylot off the barn, which is coarse packed sand/stonedust. Even with the day's heavy rain, the mud was not awful, and there didn't appear to be any places in the pasture where water was pooling. (Lawn in front of house a different story.)

Current owners have done a good job with pasture maintenance, so there's a decent amount of grass (fescue). Unfortunately, there's only about 4 acres of pasture, so I would have to find a reliable hay supplier.

Plenty of room for farrier/vet to pull back to barn and turn around; barn is well-lit and has spotlights for surrounding area too. Horse trailers would have to load/unload on the gravel road (it's a smallish subdivision with large lots, so very little traffic on the gravel road); you might be able to get a 2h bumper pull turned around by the barn, but not likely anything larger than that.

The biggest drawback is there's nowhere on the property to school. I could hack (W/T) in one of the pastures, but none of them are large enough or flat enough to do a lot of canter work or jumping. However, there are 4.5 miles of hiking/biking/riding trails in the community. Current owner also mentioned that some people in the community had an arrangement with one of the other property owners to use her ring. There's also a large lot not currently developed whose owners keep it mowed, and current owner said people are allowed to ride there. Current owner gave me a copy of the trail map for the neighborhood, and we did a drive-by on our way out. Trails look to be well-maintained and pretty; current owner said there's a group that rides once a week at a certain time, and there are annual trail cleanup days.

House has a propane-powered generator that powers the well pump, so access to water during a power outage shouldn't be a problem.

What we liked most about the property was how well current owners had maintained it. Nothing's terribly fancy, but everything is in good working order.

[crosscreeksh]

Sounds like a great/workable place. Good Luck!!

[FlashGordon]

Ummmmm..... do it!

[feather river]

I have a 20 foot barn aisle. I wouldn't have anything less than 16 foot. What is with 6 foot?? Custom homes have hallways that are 4 foot. Whoever built the barn you are looking at knew nothing about barns/horses/livestock. And the stalls are pony sized. I have overnight only stalls at 12' by 12' and they are a minimum size for a medium warmblood--my mare barn stalls are 12'6" by 16'. And they are on a shed row with a 10 foot covered area in front of each stall.

The barn you are looking at sounds like a closet.

If everything else is good with the house and the rest of the property, put up a legitimate barn, and turn that thing into a potting shed.

[onelanerode]

I have a 20 foot barn aisle. I wouldn't have anything less than 16 foot. What is with 6 foot?? Custom homes have hallways that are 4 foot. Whoever built the barn you are looking at knew nothing about barns/horses/livestock. And the stalls are pony sized. I have overnight only stalls at 12' by 12' and they are a minimum size for a medium warmblood--my mare barn stalls are 12'6" by 16'. And they are on a shed row with a 10 foot covered area in front of each stall.

The barn you are looking at sounds like a closet.

If everything else is good with the house and the rest of the property, put up a legitimate barn, and turn that thing into a potting shed.

How fortunate for me, then, that I am 5'2" on a good day in the morning, and thus riding sturdy ponies isn't an issue.

Is it ideal? No. Is it what I, or most horse people, would have done? No. I like 12x12 stalls and a 10-12 foot aisle myself. Is it, with careful planning and consideration, workable? Well, it certainly seems to be. Current owner has ~15.2 hand and ~16 hand geldings who've been there for 14 years, and they looked content and healthy. It is small, but after seeing the place, I don't think it's impossibly small.

If we put in an offer, we'll be doing so knowing that any future equine inhabitants will be under 16 hands, there won't be any more than three equids of some kind, and we'll also be doing our best with careful pasture maintenance to keep them out as much as we can, which is better for them anyway. Thankfully the climate here is conducive to this.

We've already discussed removing the first stall on the right, where hay is currently stored, and perhaps enclosing the lean-to on the right side of the barn for hay storage. That, along with some white paint, would open up a big part of the barn and make it roomier and brighter.

[Trevelyan96]

It sounds workable for a private facility, and finding a property that's ready to move into, requires no major maintenance, and has a nice house is definitly worth serious consideration. In some over-populated areas on the east and west coast, it would be the equivalent of heaven. One major thing I'd be looking for is adequate hay storage.

If you make the aisle for humans only and tie/groom in the stalls, you should not have any problems. Turn in/out through the dutch doors. Remove one of the stall fronts that you won't be using, and you'll have a nice open area for the vet/farrier to work in as well.

[TrotTrotPumpkn]

I have a 20 foot barn aisle. I wouldn't have anything less than 16 foot. What is with 6 foot?? Custom homes have hallways that are 4 foot. Whoever built the barn you are looking at knew nothing about barns/horses/livestock. And the stalls are pony sized. I have overnight only stalls at 12' by 12' and they are a minimum size for a medium warmblood--my mare barn stalls are 12'6" by 16'. And they are on a shed row with a 10 foot covered area in front of each stall.

The barn you are looking at sounds like a closet.

If everything else is good with the house and the rest of the property, put up a legitimate barn, and turn that thing into a potting shed.

You are very fortunate. I have visited many, many barns (showbarns, etc.) and the vast majority of stalls were 12x12' and the vast majority of aisles were around 12'-14'.

[PeteyPie]

South of the Mason Dixon line on a small farm, this seems pretty common to me.
In a barn like that, the aisle is not meant for the horses. The outside overhang is meant for the horses. Anything that you might want to do in the aisle, you do under the overhang. The horses go in and out from the outside, not the aisle.

The aisle is only for you, to feed, to muck, to carry hay. And that is wide enough for a garden size tractor, which is about all you'll need on 10 acres anyway. I have 10 acres, and a full size tractor would make hubby happy, but is not needed at all.

Go look at the place.

This makes sense to me. Think of this barn as back-to-back shedrow barns with a 6' interior alley for you to access the back of each stall. The front of the stall is the part facing outward onto the 10' overhang side and the horses can be taken in and out that way.

[Bluey]

This makes sense to me. Think of this barn as back-to-back shedrow barns with a 6' interior alley for you to access the back of each stall. The front of the stall is the part facing outward onto the 10' overhang side and the horses can be taken in and out that way.

Yes, the 6' aisle is more a feeding aisle for humans, not a leading or working aisle for horse traffic and working on them there but rarely, in a pinch.

Taking one corner stall to open the barn is a great idea and you can put it back in, if you needed it back at some time later.

The whole sounds fine for a small, private barn, with a few horses and only one person working there and room to be out of the weather for that in the space taking that stall out will provide.

[tcgelec]

I have a 4- stall barn with 3- 12 X 12 stalls and a 12 X 12 tack/ feed room. My aisle is 7' wide X 24' long.

All of my horses are about 16hh, and I have no problem working with them and turning them around in the 7' aisle.

I have had no complaints from vet, farrier, trainer, or dentist about working in the aisle.

I do have another set of crossties in the rear stableyard that I use only as a wash rack.

I am in suburbia. My township limits the size barn you can build to 750 s.f. without a variance, obtaining which can be a long drawn out process, and they also limit the amount of horses you can keep.

I wasn't looking to go through the variance proceedings so I went with what was allowed without. Wanted 12 X 12 stalls, so ended up with a barn 31' X 24'. Good size (in-out) stalls, workable aisle, separate hay shed (as they also restrict height to 15' so no loft without a variance either)

I'm happy. My horses are happy and healthy. What more? For myself, the bigger issue would be no on-site schooling ring. Mine is only 60 X 100 but I trailer out to trainer's once a week. But if that's not an issue go for it!