Who's Making Money Breeding Ball Pythons?

This poll was suggested during discussion in another thread. So, who out there is making money, losing money, or breaking even?

Hmmm...good question....
Last year I kept track of every dime for the year....Rats and Mice, supplies, show fees and expenses, racks, ads, you name it I logged it. Every snake I bought and sold and produced...
I hatched out 70 Ball Pythons and 29 Red Tails...kept 14 babies out of what I produced...higher end stuff...2.4 Dbl het Albino/Pieds 2.2 Dbl het Axa/Pieds, Spider Het Pied, Pastave female, Het Albino female and a Lemon Blast male.
Spent $17,150.00 buying snakes and had $5,400.00 of babies from 2011 that I sold in 2012 and by the time I closed the books for 2011 I had lost $11,254.00. Now if I would have sold what I kept I would have came out ahead but what fun is that.
Travis
Lair of Dragons

Colin Weaver wrote an interesting artical on the subject of trying to turn a profit BP breeding

http://ballpythonbreeder.com/2011/03...on-investment/

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Originally Posted by Lair of Dragons

Now if I would have sold what I kept I would have came out ahead but what fun is that.

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Travis, yours is an excellent example of a net loss that I would consider a sum total gain!

Mike Wilbanks had a video on the "ball python game" pretty recently. The gist of it was basically you cant go wrong investing in balls lol! I havent bred yet, plan to this fall though. I dont ever see myself breeding for profit really. My ultimate goal is just to profuce high quality animals that i love and that hopefully customers love too. I'll probably hold back as many as i can my 1st few years anyways. Most holdbacks will be the best snakes i produce. So ya, eventually if i can make a little extra cash doing it then ya thatd be awesome. Even if i can make enough just to cover food/bedding/other costs id be happy :)
I'll see if i can get a link to mikes video, hang tight everbody...

EDIT: heres where i saw the video from:
http://thereptilereport.com/mike-wil...the-ball-game/

This my first year breeding. Whether I break even or get a profit will depend on the odds of what hatches. We'll just have to wait and see.

I don't care if I never make a dime of profit from my snakes. Sure...it'd be nice if my hobby paid for itself, but it's just that: a hobby. People have all sorts of hobbies...for my dad it was his Corvette...and I promise you that never MADE him any money. This is my hobby. :)

We just started so we aren't expecting to come out ahead for at least another year or two. We'll be lucky/happy if our handful of clutches can pay for this year's expenses.

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Originally Posted by spitzu

We just started so we aren't expecting to come out ahead for at least another year or two. We'll be lucky/happy if our handful of clutches can pay for this year's expenses.

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I found that very hard to do....I keep buying BP's and started out with spending no more than $400.00 for a snake the first year...then the next year it went up to $700.00 and this year I have bought some to where its up to $2000.00. Only been back in BPs for three breeding seasons. Collection went from 5 first year and 1 clutch...second year had 30 something BPs and 15 clutches and the count now is 67 in year three years and if I hit 100% female production it would be 28 clutches. I am averaging spending about $1500.00 a month adding more morphs this year so far and I dont have a single egg out yet...got to love it and my wife understands the addiction....thank God.
Travis
Lair of Dragons

I can't answer yet as I just started breeding. I plan to start tracking expense, but I know that so far I am way behind. I haven't made a single penny yet, but hope to change that soon. I finally have eggs, 2 from one of my cresties and some one the way from my ball pythons. With any luck in a few years, my hobby will at least pay for itself. :D

Ahhh, the trap of breeding success...

I can produce X number of mutation Q, sell those for $XXX each, cover my costs and pocket $1600.

Oh wait, you know what, I better keep this one, and this one, hold back this one for breeding in two years, hold back these to trade for those over there. And this pied here, nicest one I have ever seen, better hang on to that one as well.

Ah crap, now I am $700 in the hole.

:D

As much as I'm looking forward to the breeding aspect of the hobby, I really don't keep track of finances all that well. How much the snakes cost doesn't really cross my mind (aside from being able to meet my bills and savings requirements). As of right now it's where all my play money goes because it's what I do for fun! I know I haven't even gotten close to breaking even. I focus on getting the ingredients I can afford, and then try to coordinate that with my fascination for selective breeding.

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Originally Posted by Robyn@SYR

Ahhh, the trap of breeding success...

I can produce X number of mutation Q, sell those for $XXX each, cover my costs and pocket $1600.

Oh wait, you know what, I better keep this one, and this one, hold back this one for breeding in two years, hold back these to trade for those over there. And this pied here, nicest one I have ever seen, better hang on to that one as well.

Ah crap, now I am $700 in the hole.

:D

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Sad but so very true....been there and doing that...lol
Travis
Lair of Dragons

Bought my first snake a month ago, I am defiently in the hole about 1300 bucks and i plan on digging myself into that hole deeper. I still need a Female! or two!
:-)

Ya you will dig a lot deeper....why does everyone buy the males before the females....
Rebecca post jumped out at me...when I saw the ratio of males to females:
Rebecca
facebook ~ google+
www.rawreptiles.com ~ RAW Reptiles on Facebook
Snakes
5.21 Ball Pythons ~ 1.1 Hypo Jungle Boa ~ 1.1 Hog Island Boa ~ 1.1 Anery KSB

Now that's the way to do it...5 males 21 females...that has potential all over it
I have 17 males and 50 females now 6.7 are tied up to the same project year after year...dbl hets...so I really have 11 males and 43 females...
Most buy a male because they are cheaper and you can say I own that morph and the real expense hits when you start grouping that male....buy females first...they take longer to raise and you can always pick up a male that can be breeding size in a year....JMO
Travis
Lair of Dragons

This is my first season with eggs. I've picked up 4 girls in 2 weeks. I've been keeping balls for 6 years and not seen any return. I have two clutches. One will be on the ground in 12 days the other is a spider het albino x albino pair with 5 good eggs. If I get 1 albino spider and single morph hets and I have a chance of making some BELs from a mojo x mojo I can produce with bad luck $1000-2000 of offspring and with good luck $2000-5000

Define making money?

Breaking even and no longer being in the hole?

Making a small profit that allows to enjoy little extras in life?

Making a living at it?

I went from being in the hole to breaking even to now making a little profit.

What I learned from this thread:


Buy more normal females.

I'm currently am in the hole about 15k, but that could all change in the next few months. Have some big time clutches coming up, thinking I'll have about 20-25 eggs in total. Depending on sex ratio and actually making sales, I could leap right out of that hole.

to me thats a interesting question as i havent invested too much money in my collection and i trade small med rats to local breeders for single gene morphs that i sell or keep so the feeding part is takin care of rats pay for them selves as well as a new single gene every now and then so im turning a lil profit already because of my rats and havent even had a clutch as of yet even though i have a normal who is going through prelay shed and another adult cinny bred to my mojave will go soon ,so i guess it really depends on how you look at profit -rats are not snakes but i would not be breeding the rats on such a big level if not for my ball python collection so to me its not a total loss more like a gain

You can make a living at this, my last paycheck from someone else was almost five years ago. I love what I do every day!

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Originally Posted by Dave Green

You can make a living at this, my last paycheck from someone else was almost five years ago. I love what I do every day!

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Inspirational!

I need to get out of this cubicle...

I really don't care if I make money at this or not, it's just a hobby

I am currently an Apprentice Electrician, so I make more than enough money from that to support myself and have money left over for my love of Animals in general.

About a year ago I fell in love with Ball Pythons after discovering a Black Eyed Lucy.
I love the look of them, and I hope that one day in the future I may be able to produce a Black Eyed Lucy with as little markings as possible
at least this is one of my projects :D
Unfortunately I didn't do enough research on them before I found myself at an Expo, spending $700 on a pair of Fire's :rolleyes:
Once I do produce it, I will not be selling it, (s)he is going to have a nice spot somewhere in my apartment (or future house) where they will be displayed comfortably

I have a few other projects I'd love to work on (Super Fire Pied, Panda Pied) down the road, and the only money I will be "Making" will be put right back into it, buying Food etc.

I really wish I were keeping track of every little dime we spend, but Boyfriend isn't so great at keeping receipts and whatnot.

I need to create a spreadsheet. Then again, if I see how much we're actually spending, maybe I won't want to breed anymore...lol!

2012 is going to be our first "big" breeding year. We are HOPING for 7 clutches, but would even be happy with 5. Now that most of our females are up to size (aside from 1 new addition), I absolutely expect to be breaking even and maybe even having a bit extra. That's not including my corn clutches, either.

Oh but we want new racks...Damn. Maybe we'll go a bit in the hole this year, too :P

We do breed our own rats now, which is saving us a monstrous amount of $.

Ah, I just don't know. I'm certain we are losing $, LOL!

I would just be happy IF the odd gods shined on me and my clutch would cover the cost of upkeep for my rats.
Making a living at it would be a dream come true BUT like I said, if the snakes could pay for the rats and mice I would be happy with the full circle:gj:

ummmm havent made a dime as of yet. lol I log everything down to the bedding for feeders. Im still growing my collection up to breeding size. I produced only one clutch last year and still have 1.1 left outta 2.5 I cant complain tho I only advertised on craigslist. year after next I should be breaking even for the inital start up and maybe in 5 years i'll be actually turning a profit if I can keep from hoarding my favs. lol I only breed what I like the looks of and i guess my taste are a bit diff than most.

I've generally made a profit from doing business within the industry but my own personal breeding projects I'm probably just breaking even. This year may be very different though.

I'll have to revisit this thread at the end of the year...as of now, I'm planning on being 100% out of the red soon enough. Then I'm planning on taking pretty much all of that and dump most of it right back in.

While far from trying to make breeding a full time gig, I'll admit that I do want to and plan to make some money. Not a lot, but more than just to cover costs. If I wanted a hobby that is an endless money pit, I'd learn to play golf.

This year i might come close to breaking even depending on how many i hold back and how many girls go

Well, I've made back my initial investment, but we won't likely have this as a sole source of income for perhaps 3 or 4 more years.

I've been out of the red for a couple years now, the hobby I love will likely keep supplementing my income going forward.

I say likely because I might keep 80% of the cool stuff I produce. The best part of all this for me is producing that animal I've been working to get for a couple years. Can't beat that feeling.

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Originally Posted by Emilio

I've been out of the red for a couple years now, the hobby I love will likely keep supplementing my income going forward.

I say likely because I might keep 80% of the cool stuff I produce. The best part of all this for me is producing that animal I've been working to get for a couple years. Can't beat that feeling.

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What animal did you wanna produce?!?

I haven't hatched anything yet. But I really don't see myself making any profit or even breaking even for many years to come. If the snakes can pay for their supplies and food(rat food/bedding for my breeders), I'll be content.

But I'm not really in it for the money. I started out getting snakes because they're beautiful animals.

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Originally Posted by Mike41793

What animal did you wanna produce?!?

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I'm looking to produce a lot of axanthic stuff in the coming years, I was really happy when I produced my first Super yellowbelly and Super Lesser.

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Originally Posted by Emilio

I'm looking to produce a lot of axanthic stuff in the coming years, I was really happy when I produced my first Super yellowbelly and Super Lesser.

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Nice! Im on the opposite end of the color spectrum, im hoping to produce a super cinny next year! My first ywar breeding, fingers crossed :)

Sorry, accidentally pressed send.
I think snakes alone I am about $1,300 in the red, and I would really like to add $400 to that before the year is out. Then there was the rack at about $800, and not counting anything rodent related. I breed my own but feed and bedding adds up, once in a blue moon I sell a rat or mouse. Hopefully I will get 2 clutches this year but nothing deffinate yet and I know I will not be selling much of my first 2 clutches unless I really luck out on the odds. Maybe next year if I am lucky I will start to get out of the hole? I love this hobby tho! If I can make a living at it great, if not maybe I can at least support my rodents and the occasional new addition.

I got a D in accounting in college. However I still notice one thing here is a lot of you are counting the snakes that you bought and their cost as "money lost". Yes you spent the money by the end of the year but that is not money lost. You still have the snakes which will breed for you in the future years.

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Originally Posted by hungba

I got a D in accounting in college. However I still notice one thing here is a lot of you are counting the snakes that you bought and their cost as "money lost". Yes you spent the money by the end of the year but that is not money lost. You still have the snakes which will breed for you in the future years.

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Exactly!

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Originally Posted by Mike41793

Nice! Im on the opposite end of the color spectrum, im hoping to produce a super cinny next year! My first ywar breeding, fingers crossed :)

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I bought my cinny in 08 to make that same snake, I might try Cinny x Black pastel next season.

I've been making money breeding snakes for 20 years. The key to my success has been staying focused on MY goals. I don't get caught up in all the morph hype and "I have to have every morph" mentality. Im still expanding and evolving in the hobby and will continue to do so. Purchase wisely my friends.

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Originally Posted by hungba

I got a D in accounting in college. However I still notice one thing here is a lot of you are counting the snakes that you bought and their cost as "money lost". Yes you spent the money by the end of the year but that is not money lost. You still have the snakes which will breed for you in the future years.

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hungba is right! I love business too and have a solid background in it. The snakes are equity. They are also a constant revenue stream if they are healthy and able to produce for you. Done properly it is not difficult to run this hobby as a business. It requires smart buying decisions, thoughtful breeding plans, a discerning eye for choosing your initial breeding stock, time, and patience.

I think something people tend to forget is that it costs money to make money. I've saved lots of money by taking a DIY approach to caging, incubation, rodents, and other aspects of the hobby. The money I've saved doing things myself has allowed me to invest more in my animals. I'm heating the same room whether I have 2 snakes or 50 snakes. I breed my own rats so it is only time consuming to bump up my production. The trivial cost for an extra bag of rat feed is greatly exceeded by having quality rodents readily available in any size. I believe that both the heated room and quality rodents are key to my collection's health and substantial growth rates.

Investing in something beyond a handful of single gene animals and breeder normals is the best way to get into the black in my opinion. If you're trying to climb your way up with 3 or 4 single gene snakes it can be done. It is going to take a considerable amount of time and effort. However, when you start breeding 10+ clutches with the potential to hit 2-4 gene snakes + recessives it really adds up fast.

I'm only expecting 6-7 clutches this year and I should be even in term of actual cash invested. I will actually be double or triple my investment if you take into consideration the equity of my collection. Next year I should be expecting 20+ clutches and should be close to my dream of doing this full-time.

I've seen dozens of people exit and leave the hobby within the last year. This is not a "get rich quick" scheme. How far you go with it is up to you. Ultimately, you should be prepared for a solid commitment of time and money if you want to be successful. You can save time if you have money. Otherwise you can invest more time and still find success.

I would just like to close with the following thoughts if you are thinking about getting into Ball Python breeding.

It is your hobby. It should be your passion. And it can be your business.


Regards,

B

So my husband says if you net less than $5k a year, you can call it "hobby income". But more than that, and it's tax-able? Is that right?

Last year was my first year breeding, so this year is my first year getting money out instead of only putting it in.

And now I've got 5 or 6 females ovulating or building. :O So I'm going to need more racks... and a bigger incubator... and I might really have to track how much money I spend vs. make this year for tax purposes. Um. Wow?

Pretty sure you have to claim anything over $500 or so. I may be wrong

Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk 2

I have yet to make any money and if I do, it won't be for a LONG time. Besides, I'm in it for the love of it :)

It's actually anything over $599.99 gross. Just save your receipts and keep great records. If you raise your own rodents, consider that a business as well and buy them from yourself. When you feed a snake for 6 months and sell it at the same price as when it was 6 days, you can claim all of the food as a deduction on the sale. There are tons of things you can use as operating costs for your taxes.

Brandon, how does that work? I asked two different accountants about that and they shot the idea down.

I believe I asked something along the lines of "can I claim a certain amount of $$ per rat, based off of what I would have paid to someone else".

Like with any small buisness the expenses you have to operate the buisness is a deduction. Therefore rats would be a deduction as long as you are filing as a buisness. Also the aquare footage of your operating space is also a deduction. Just like a home office would be. Now if your not filing as a buisness then trying to get deductions for feeding and operating would be a hard thing to do without utilizing all the shades of gray in the tax world. And the irs pays close attention to those skirting the gray areas

I'm in the boat of having invested more than I've made. Last year was my first year breeding, and I made about $200 above what I put into it. This year, I'm way deeper into it, but should come out ahead.

As others have said, I'll have to revisit this thread at the end of the year to re-evaluate what the status is, whether red or black...

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Originally Posted by spitzu

Brandon, how does that work? I asked two different accountants about that and they shot the idea down.

I believe I asked something along the lines of "can I claim a certain amount of $$ per rat, based off of what I would have paid to someone else".

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You need to carefully select who does your accounting. Feeding is a large business expense and is probably the largest deduction next to travel expense and the cost of new animals. Yes, you can claim animals too.

I've been a professional musician for many years. I know the items I can claim on my music income. Everything you use for operating costs is deductible.

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Originally Posted by hungba

I got a D in accounting in college. However I still notice one thing here is a lot of you are counting the snakes that you bought and their cost as "money lost". Yes you spent the money by the end of the year but that is not money lost. You still have the snakes which will breed for you in the future years.

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Which is why the thread asks who IS making money and not who might, possibly, theoretically make some money at some point in the future.

There is no value in polling people to see who thinks they might some day end up with more money from the hobby than they spent. Look at the responses for the poll. Obviously most people SHOULD consider it money lost.