GUILDERLAND — A Guilderland property owner says he will soon be forced to sell the Western Turnpike land he had rented to Victoria Acres Equine Facility for six years, so that he can concentrate on getting medical treatment.

Victoria Acres is a not-for-profit organization that offers not only regular riding lessons but also programs in confidence-building for veterans and for children and adults with disabilities.

Erin Pashley, founder and executive director, appeared before the town’s planning board with property owner John Seminary in March, when Seminary sought to carve one 10-acre lot out of the 27.8-acre property where he lives; that new lot includes the existing barn and pasture area that Victoria Acres has rented for years.

The not-for-profit wanted to buy the 10-acre lot and put up an indoor facility, as a permanent home for its programs that would allow it to offer them year-round. Currently, the facility closes down from about November through April, and Pashley told The Enterprise that Victoria Acres has, since this April, needed to cancel four additional weeks of lessons because of weather.

Programs offered at Victoria Acres include therapeutic riding and Horses4Heroes for military veterans who may need help integrating back into society, Pashley said. The program has worked closely with horses as a way of teaching people life skills, anger management, and better communication.

The program has five horses and offers lessons to between 50 and 55 regular clients each week, Pashley said, and continues to grow quickly, through word-of-mouth.

The property is in an RA-3 zoning district, a residential-agricultural district where properties must be at least three acres in size.  

The planning board unanimously approved the subdivision, and Victoria Acres set about applying for a mortgage.

According to Pashley, the bank gave her the names of three appraisers she could contact to have an appraisal done. She says she contacted the cheapest one and concluded, “That did me in.”

The appraisal came in at $315,000, which is $35,000 lower than another appraisal she had had done earlier. It was too low, she said, to be able to buy the property and put up the indoor facility.

Banks typically loan only about 80 percent of the appraised amount, Pashley said, and putting up the indoor facility alone will cost $95,000. The purchase price of the land will be between $265,000 and $270,000, she said.

Through a GoFundMe campaign called “Support Victoria Acres Equine,” Pashley now hopes to raise $30,000 to supplement her funding. The fund has raised only $435 to date.

Pashley told The Enterprise that she has also been conducting a capital campaign, reaching out to corporations for help, but has not had much luck.

Seminary, 70, told The Enterprise that he has to sell the new 10-acre lot, to get the property squared away so that he can focus on his health.

Asked how much more time Pashley has before Seminary puts the 10-acre property up for sale, he said, “If she has something close in the works, I could wait, but her time is pretty much up.”

He said that he should have been hospitalized three or four months ago, but that he has been putting off treatment, to try to get his finances in order.

“If it wasn’t for that, she could just keep on renting from me indefinitely,” Seminary said.