Help our parents save their farm

Greetings! For those of you who have already donated - thank you SO much!! We have received a few requests for more detail, so the original posting has been edited a bit, but we did not want the original folks who donated to see the additional information and feel like something fishy was going on.

Hey there. Usually, this family is not the type to ask for things, but my parents have given me and my sisters everything, made so many sacrifices to keep our farm safe, and it's time for us to return the favor. My two sisters and I need help. So, a little history.

Our parents, George and Kim, have been married for almost 36 years. They met through their horses 3 years before that and ran a large equine facility for a few years, and then moved to our farm in 1991 with the dream of continuing to work with retired, recuperating, or resting horses with investors to help get them started. Once moved in, due to events beyond their control…. broken promises by investors, purposeful malevolent interference resulting in a frivolous lawsuit against us over the ownership of the farm, a house fire in 2008 that burned our house almost to the ground, lawsuits with unscrupulous contractors and financers on the rebuild on the house, and many more smaller issues… It's been a constant stress-filled financial and legal struggle ever since to keep it. One of their main goals has always been to leave the property in good financial shape as a successful self-sustaining small business that the 3 of us girls could take over and be set and secure for life. Most teenagers can’t wait to move out and be on their own; my sisters and I (ages 23-30) have never felt that way. We all still live at home and hope to live out our lives here to be able to leave to our children for all of us to continue caring for critters in need. One of our best friends from childhood has now joined our family and feels the same way about our farm, our goals, our sanctuary.

My parents are both huge animal lovers and raised the 3 of us to be the same. They moved in with 5 horses, and since then, the animal family grew along with the human family. They (and then we) have worked hard to make this property a sanctuary of peace, not only for us, but literally for hundreds of animals as well as several human equine boarders who trusted us with their loved ones - the majority of the horses from the point of retirement to the natural end of their lives, but also cats, dogs, birds, and other critters. Many of the horses lived well into their late 20’s and early 30’s, until quality of life issues overtook quantity of life. My parents always said that they could deal with ugly scars, injuries, blindness, deafness, and other challenges, but once the quality of life was compromised, either by relentless pain or suffering, they would help the owners make the right decision for their loved ones.

Now, 36 years later and in their older years, fighting health issues as well as living off of fixed income from social security, those payments have become so much harder to pay, and again, still sacrificing so much to make sure the mortgage and credit line is paid, while still making sure the critters all have what they need. Many is the time that our human family has sat down to big plates of buttered noodles all week so that the critters don’t go without. Vacations? Movies? Going out to dinner? Shopping for new clothes? Not. Not. Not. Not. But even with the help of the four of us, physically and financially, we are barely breaking even each month, can’t get ahead of necessary repairs, certainly not able to expand to build the business, and still have this threat hanging over us. It's a complicated back history but mostly due to the past legal problems listed above, their credit prevents the usual options like refinancing, loans, even declaring bankruptcy is out due to a judgement in their favor that is considered an asset even though they have not received one penny of it and now all the criminals involved have passed away, so they never will. My parents often say that there are many things that they both would do differently knowing what they know now, but NOW is the problem and they are quite literally stuck.

The biggest concern is the credit line, which has around $21,000 left on it. They have less than 4 years to pay off the credit line or they will be considered to be in default and the bank will demand immediate payment on the balance of the main mortgage and the farm will be ripped away from us. We know this is a lot to ask, but we don't know what else to do. We wish everybody who loves animals could see how many horses and critters have lived better lives because they found their way to our family farm.

If you are able to do so, please help our parents see their dreams of a safe and secure farm that will carry on their life’s work.