Texas resident Daisy Ford loves her 18-year-old horse, Charly, so much that she convinced her parents to build him his own retirement home on their property where he could live out the remainder of his life.
The $2.2 million space is well-deserved for Charly, who competed with Daisy throughout her childhood and teenage years in show-jumping events around the world and won two Grand Prix before she saw that he was ready to retire.
‘I was never going to push him if he didn’t want to do it anymore,’ Daisy tells DailyMail.com.
And while most jumping and show horses live out the remainder of their lives in regular old barns, Daisy didn’t want that for Charly, who had gone above and beyond working for her over the years.
‘He literally transformed my entire riding career,’ she says.
‘We bought this whole property and moved out here basically so that we could retire him here because I didn’t want him to be boarded somewhere. There’s a lot of nice retirement options but you don’t have the ability to see everything going on.’
After convincing her parents, Tina and Matt Ford, who own Ford design firm in Texas Hill Country, that this would be best for Charly, the family snapped up 11.5 acres for $400,000 outside of Austin. They then spent the next four years building a new 3,000-square-foot house and barn.
The complete build totaled $2.2 million dollars.
Charly can roam free on the two-acre rolling hill pasture all day if he pleases
Charly trots past the kitchen windows to let the family know he wants a snack
The family has a menagerie of animals that roam all over their farm
‘They were completely on board with it,’ Daisy says.
‘He had already paid his dues across the board and they bought the farm several years before we were retired him in 2023, knowing that he was going to live with us.’
The family’s modern home totals 3,000-square feet and has wide large pasture-adjacent windows that Charly peeks into when he wants his breakfast.
But the family spent the most…