I was recently looking at some horses on the internet for a friend of mine, and ran across a few Free Horse ads. I was curious to see why they were free. Often They are old and are offered as companion horses only.

In a few cases, the horses were young, one a rideable trained MFT gelding, and another, a QH Andalusian cross 14-month old filly, the situation was not clear...also, no photos...the grammar was poor and the ad didn't make sense...

The MFT was supposed to be a free lease, which usually means the owner wants the horse nearby so they can ride or monitor the horse also, and jusy need someone to share expenses and keep the horse in condition for whatever reason. But i was 2,000 miles away and couldn't see how that would work!

I was told of the QH/Andy cross, after a few emails back and forth could run 65km (whatever that means...it wasn't supposed to be a racehorse)...was sent a few pics of a lovely foal romping in a field.

Anyway, the telltale sign was that in the 3rd email, I was assured that $1500 was a reasonable price to pay them for shipping the horse to me, plus negotiable expenses upon arrival at my place. This is a huge leap from a general inquiry about the horse, and not getting any real details (name, registration, type of training it had, etc.).

I was going to answer back, that I'd like to use my own shipper, to see what their response would be, but instead notified the website that I thought it was a scam. They removed both sellers from the site and I blocked their names in my email address book.

BEWARE...Anybody who wants your money before your inquiries are answered satisfactorily is relying on you thinking you're getting a bargain and is pressuring you to move fast on the deal.

That said, I missed out on a perfectly legitimate purchase of a lovely colt by about 4 hours, because I put off sending a deposit so I could get some shipping bids first. : (

Margo