With their eyes set on quality horses for lower costs, pinhookers Nick de Meric, Raul Reyes and Scott Kintz are attending the 2021 Keeneland September Yearling Sale in the hopes of purchasing their next big graduates.
Nick de Merick, founder of de Meric Sales, began reselling horses over 20 years ago. He says that he has changed the way he buys because of how his business and the market have shifted over time.
"It doesn't make much sense for us to be buying $15,000 or $20,000 horses … there was a time when we could do that because we would be doing all the work ourselves and our costs would be minimal," de Meric said. "Now, by the time we've insured them, and we have a big crew and significant expenses getting them from A to B, that business model doesn't make sense for us. The less pedigree we have, we really need A+ physicals. Truthfully, we're trying to find A physicals all the way down the line, but they're getting very expensive."
Buying mainly through Book 3, de Meric "cherry picks" when he reaches Books 4 and 5.
"We know we've got October coming—the (Ocala Breeders' Sales) yearling sale, Maryland (Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Fall Yearlings)—there's still other opportunities," de Meric said.
With seven purchases already made at the Keeneland September sale, de Meric said that previously the horses that he bought would be the higher-priced buys of the entire season, although that has changed dramatically because of movement within the industry.
"We're trying to buy good stallions or exciting young stallions. We've got a Curlin , two Medaglia d'Oro colts, a Candy Ride , and a Quality Road … We're looking for some good fifty-thousand, sixty-thousand-dollar horses," de Meric said. "Of course, there was a time when those were your expensive purchase for the year. Not anymore. Those are just, dare I say it, the cheapies… When you take that money out of the horse business and put it back in the real world, that's somebody's life savings. But we talk about it casually, like it's monopoly money."
Vetting is always an important aspect of purchasing to resell and according to de Meric, potential problems that are important to him have varied, although he prefers not to buy horses that need surgery.
"It's an evolving process. There used to be a time when we would blow off sesamoiditis and not be concerned about it; now it's something we're very concerned about," de Meric said. "We do a lot of scanning if there's a horse we really love that has even mild to moderate sesamoiditis. We like to try and get them scanned if we can.
"There's some things that we're fairly forgiving of on vetting and there's some things that we absolutely don't forgive. At the end of the day, we're looking for the cleanest horses we can get. We need clean scopes… they have to have a good, nice, wide throat… I'd say we have to be fairly strict on vetting as a general rule of thumb, but we don't obsess over little things."
Another man looking to pick out classy yearlings for a bargain this year is the trainer and owner of King's Equine, Raul Reyes.
With seven already purchased at Keeneland, Reyes would like to add around another 15 to his team.
"I bought out of Book 1, Book 2, and Book 3… I try to buy not very expensive, (in the range of) $100,000, $75,000, or $125,000," Reyes said.
Reyes stays away from selecting horses purely on pedigree, and tends to give the horse the chance to prove themselves as an individual.
"I go for the opportunity to buy a horse so that he can get better, and people will accept him (if) he goes fast, after he breezes well. People don't want to accept any stallion if he doesn't breeze well," Reyes said.
As far as vetting, Reyes said there was one thing that he has learned through his experience with resale.
"Lower joints on the knees, that's the number one thing I run away from," he said. "The only thing that I learned, even if your horse performs the best, people won't buy them."
Scott Kintz, owner of Six K's Training and Sales, enjoys the advantages of buying yearlings and seeing their abilities unfold before him.
"Athleticism means the most to me. Obviously if you can get athleticism, pedigree, and vetting, that's a plus," he said. "You have to give up something. One thing I don't ever want to give up is athleticism... That's the difference we have over yearling people, we can prove they can run, or they can't run, unfortunately. A lot can be given up if they prove they can run."
Kintz tends to buy in the $20,000 to $50,000 range and finds that the outside of the horse is often more valuable than a pedigree.
"I think that people get hung up on (sires) a little bit, and if they can run, they start forgetting who they're by… A lot of times I don't look at certain sires because I know I can't buy them," Kintz said. "If I can afford to resell them then there's probably a hole in them somewhere, so I'd rather not waste my time and their time. The chances of me getting one of those, it would have to come through the breeder.
"Obviously the closer to $20,000, the better for me. There's just not the pressure to make it. In that way I can also get a group… No matter how many you buy, it's all about percentages. The more bullets you can fire, the better shot you'll have."
When vetting potential buys, Kintz said his decision to forgive flaws depends on the particular horse.
"There's some things that don't scare me off as bad. Stifles scare the heck out of me. Hocks don't scare anybody. It also depends on how much you like the horse," Kintz said. "If it's a really nice horse and you're getting it for a really discounted price because of whatever issue he has… if it needs surgery and it's going to be a clean surgery, I don't have a problem at all.
"Air is one thing you can't give up on… There are some bone issues that get better or maybe don't even become a problem. It just depends. I think there's certain people that can handle different things. For some people sesamoiditis is a problem, and for some people it's not."
