Dog Training in New York

A New York dog is asked to do something most dogs never face. Ride an elevator with strangers. Walk a sidewalk where the next dog is two feet away and there is no lane to move into. Stay quiet through a wall that is thinner than it looks. Hold together on a subway platform, in a lobby, at a dog run with thirty dogs in it. There is no margin in this city, and a dog that is nearly trained is a dog that is not trained.

Best Buddy Dog Training is Shawn Hines. We train in your apartment, your building and your neighborhood, because that is where your dog has to behave. What we build is a dog that looks to you in the elevator, on Broadway and in the dog run - not because a pocket is rattling, but because you have become the one who is in charge.

We work with families from the Upper West Side to the Hudson Valley through in-home sessions and a four-to-six-week board-and-train program. Everything starts with a free phone conversation.

Where We Train in New York

• Westchester County - White Plains, Scarsdale, Rye, New Rochelle, Bronxville, Yonkers, Mamaroneck, Larchmont, Mount Kisco, Chappaqua
• Putnam & Rockland - Carmel, Mahopac, Cold Spring, Nyack, New City, Suffern
• Hudson Valley - Beacon, Fishkill, Poughkeepsie, Newburgh, New Paltz, Kingston, Rhinebeck
• New York City - Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Riverdale, and the Bronx
• Long Island & Nassau County - By arrangement. Garden City, Manhasset, Great Neck and the North Shore are reachable; call and we will work out the schedule.

If your town isn't listed, ask. Between the city, Westchester and the Hudson Valley we are almost always nearby on a given week.

The New York Dog Problems We See Most

The elevator and the lobby

The doors open and there is another dog, a stroller, a delivery cart, a neighbor who is afraid of dogs. Your dog barks, lunges, or plants its feet and refuses to get on. Twice a day, every day, for the life of the dog. This is the single most common call we get from Manhattan and Riverdale, and it is one of the fastest to fix, because the elevator is a small box with clear rules and we can rehearse it fifty times in an afternoon.

Sidewalk reactivity at arm's length

Columbus Avenue at six in the evening, Seventh Avenue in Park Slope, the walk to the train in Bronxville. Dogs pass nose to nose because there is nowhere else to go. A dog that explodes at every oncoming dog turns a ten-minute walk into a thing you dread. We train on the actual block, at real distances, until passing another dog is simply what happens on the way to the corner.

Barking through the wall

Pre-war buildings have thick walls. Most of the city doesn't. A dog that barks at the hallway, the buzzer, the doorman's knock or the dog next door is a complaint to the board waiting to happen, and in a co-op that complaint has teeth. Threshold and settle work - who answers the door, where the dog goes when the buzzer sounds - quiets most of these dogs in a session or two.

The dog run

Tompkins Square, Carl Schurz, the run at Hillside in Prospect Park, Ward Acres in New Rochelle. Twenty or thirty dogs in a fenced pen, and yours either bullies the room or hides under the bench. Neither one is a dog you can trust with the gate open. We work on the dog's state of mind before it goes in, so the run stops being a gamble.

Off-leash hours in Central Park and Prospect Park

Before nine in the morning the Long Meadow and the Great Lawn fill with loose dogs, joggers, cyclists and people carrying breakfast. Owners call their dogs and get nothing back. A recall that only works when nothing else is happening is a recall you will never use here. We build the version that works with a hundred distractions in view, and we build it on that grass.

Westchester trails and back roads

Rockefeller State Park Preserve, Ward Pound Ridge, the Bronx River path. Horses, deer, cyclists and dogs that are supposed to be on a leash and aren't. The suburbs give a dog more room than the city and more ways to get into trouble with it.

Aggression and bite history

Guarding the couch, snapping at a child, a bite that cost you a neighbor or a dog walker. These are the calls we take most seriously. Tell us on the phone and we will plan the first session around it.

In-Home Dog Training in New York

Four private sessions with Shawn in your apartment or house, in your hallway and elevator, and on your block. Before any of that, a free phone consultation, so the plan is built for your dog and the building you live in rather than for a dog in general.

What the program includes:

New York in-home program: $2,500.

Board and Train for New York Dogs

For some dogs, four sessions is the wrong shape. A dog with a bite history, a dog that has failed two trainers, a dog whose owner works twelve-hour days and cannot do the homework - these dogs do better living with Shawn for four to six weeks and training every single day.

The work happens in real environments, not a kennel. Crowded sidewalks, busy parks, other dogs, strangers at the door. When the dog comes home, its obedience has already been tested in public, and Shawn brings it back himself, walks it into your building and shows you how to keep what he built. Three reintegration sessions at your home and lifetime follow-up support are included.

Board-and-train also solves a practical New York problem: it works just as well for an owner on the Upper East Side as for one in Kingston, because Shawn does the pickup and delivery either way.

See how the board and train program works →

Common Questions from New York Owners

Start with a Free Phone Consultation

Call tel:+14015367982 and tell Shawn what your dog is doing in the elevator, on the sidewalk, at the door. There is no sales script. It is a conversation about whether we can help and which program fits your dog and your building. We don't have a facility - training happens where you live - and for board-and-train, Shawn handles the pickup and the drop-off in person.

Office hours are Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm, and Saturday 9am to 5pm. If it's outside of those hours, or we're working with a dog when you call, leave a message and Shawn will get back to you as soon as possible. You can also send a text message or contact us freom our contact page

Who you are to your dog is EVERYTHING

Shawn Hines
Dog Trainer, Best Buddy Dog Training