Originally Posted by runningonempty

First, I am in total agreement with you 100%. I would please like you to visit this website. And here is the website:
. This is the Three Diamond Leasing website that JCT is in charge of. If you can't get it that way just go to Google.com and put in the keywords Three Diamond Leasing. If you look right under URL it will say Sales. You will see the amount of Mr. Christner's sales are a year. It ranges between $10 million and $50 million a year. I would love to tell OOIDA if Mr. Christner did not have a decent leasing plan, how could someone get their sales that high in a year. I don't know exactly when it happened it was some time ago, one of Mr. Christner's drivers got into a very serious accident killing someone. Mr. Christner was honest and settled it out of court and paid the family of the deceased $11 million for the settlement. I would love to tell OOIDA they are full of it if they even think that Mr. Christner's lease program is bull hockey. I personally know 2 of his drivers by name where one owns 2 of his trucks and is on his third and another owns one and is on his second. Mr. Christner is only helping these men to sublease these trucks so these men can make extra money and run their own little trucking company while still driving for JCT. As far as your escrow goes, that is automatically deducted out of your paycheck. That probably why it was dropped because that driver knew he had no claim to start with. As far as that driver claiming he was suppose to be getting $0.93 cpm is totally bogus. He knew he was wrong from jump street. This is how it was explained to Ed and I. You get $0.92 cpm. The way it works is it's $0.90 cpm for the mileage, $0.02 cpm for the gas so that makes it $0.92 cpm and then you get your fuel surcharge which right now is $0.57 cpm. So right now we're getting paid $1.49 cpm. And say the fuel surcharge goes up or down, they make the adjustments on the following paycheck. So the bottom line of it, OOIDA is full of it as far as Mr. Christner is concerned. And your right about another thing. I know personally a company driver who ran 2,500 miles. He only got $700.00 dollars. Ed and I ran 2,500 miles and we got paid $1,844.00. So gee OOIDA I have no idea what so ever why I wouldn't lease from Mr. Christner. Maybe it's the paycheck difference of $1,144.00 more in our pocket that might of cohersed me to do it? You know PawPaw, what are these people thinking? I would like to reiterate one thing you said. Credit is darn tight on anything big you want to buy and these lease programs are the only way to get our foot into the door of becoming O/O's. With anything you want to buy big now a days requires an act of congress. Shoot just to buy a home now you need 600 points if not better to acquire the mortgage. Just to rest anyone's mind. Mr. Christner is a very upholding citizen. He donates to the diabetes fund. Any O/O out here will tell you you work for JCT that is one of the top notched companies out here. To heck with the OOIDA on that one. I can guarantee they mess with Mr. Christner, and all his drivers will be standing right behind him for support and to help him. Even when they become O/O's from buying their trucks from Mr. Christner, they still stay with him. Like you said 4 claims aren't nothing out of the 25 years he's been in the industry. He himself still drives. We had the pleasure of meeting one of Mr. Christner's first drivers Houston Smith. You'll see his picture hanging up in the office. He's been driving for Mr. Christner now for 19 years. Mr. Christner used to be his dispatch at another company before Mr. Christner started JCT. And the staff is A-1. I would definitely come to JCT if I was you. To me they're number one. And that's from doing research on the web. So my 2 cents, to heck with the OOIDA. Unless they actually been in our shoes, they should keep their mouths shut. Btw we just got our permanent DM and he all ready gave us our very first load assignment for 2,365 miles. Sweeeet!! And hubby's solo too! Well now you know a little background on JCT I hoped it help. Take care PawPaw and be safe out there.

Running (Sue)

Originally Posted by pawpaw

I had considered going here after I got in my 1 year's current experience. Then I began to do some other math. They say the truck price range is 77K - 116K (and these are used--up to 250K miles). On the 116K the weekly payment is around $550 for 5 years so that equals $143,001 (gotta add that $1.00 buyout) for a $117,000 truck. That works out to $27,000 in "interest". I think I could do better buying my own truck. Heck, you can buy a brand new Cascadia for $127,000. I guess you can say I have started rethinking my future plans.

Originally Posted by Capin51

Well, I agree with some of you, I am now averaging $1100 to $1250 a week as a company driver but at the end of 5 years I will not own a truck. I did the math as well and using the freightliner's "select trucks" calculator I came up with the same numbers so I'm considering buying my own truck and leasing on with JCT, I also don't know everything there is to know about leasing but I have spent countless hours doing the math and research but with the intent of moving forward I think JCT is my best option untill I can feel confortable and going with my own authority and work and deal with brokers or maybe try Landstar. Tomorrow I will be asking JCT to send me a copy of the lease/contract agreement and than I'll decide. Times are rough and this is a big decision, although, no guts no glory, right?

Originally Posted by pawpaw

I had considered going here after I got in my 1 year's current experience. Then I began to do some other math. They say the truck price range is 77K - 116K (and these are used--up to 250K miles). On the 116K the weekly payment is around $550 for 5 years so that equals $143,001 (gotta add that $1.00 buyout) for a $117,000 truck. That works out to $27,000 in "interest". I think I could do better buying my own truck. Heck, you can buy a brand new Cascadia for $127,000. I guess you can say I have started rethinking my future plans.

Originally Posted by GrizzlyMan

Hey PawPaw, I used your math. Let's figure the interest rate on that 116k loan. Five years at 8.5% interest gives you mighty close to a $550 a week payment. What kind of interest rate do you think you're going to get out of Selectrucks? Selectrucks averages more than 12% interest. If you were to buy a Cascadia for $127,000 at 6.5% interest, do you realize that you would pay $22,000 in interest? And that's if you have great credit! $27,000 in interest as you say isn't bad spread over five years. How much interest do you think you're going to pay on your house? On a 30 year $150,000 loan at 6.22% interest (today's average) you're going to pay $181,434 in interest. You will pay more than double the purchase price for something that didn't cost that much more!!!!

Now, here is my take on these lease programs. If I can make .05 per mile more by leasing than being a company driver, why shouldn't I? It's not about owning the truck, or how much money I'm going to lose (on paper, mind you), it's all about how much money winds up in my pocket. Say you drive as a company driver for five years. Average pay is $50k. That is $250k that I've made. Now I drive a lease program truck. I make $55k per year after everything. Plus I have a truck that's worth $30k. That means I've come out ahead of the company driver by $55k. A full year's wages! In that scenario, who is really getting screwed more? The company driver, who made all the money for the company, or the lease driver, who got to get a little bit of that pie back. Don't get me wrong. I don't expect every lease program to come out ahead. There are many things that are going to change those numbers. A lease driver is nothing more than a glorified company driver. And to me, I want to take as much of that pie home as I can. Even if they charged a "payment" of $7500. If I could take more home, it really doesn't matter, does it? If I started a company paying something like $14 per mile to my lease drivers, and charged them some insane payment, how many people would jump on it? You play with the numbers, and get people to chase it. That's all these lease programs are. It's not a scam. The company is figuring out how to balance it out so they make as much as they can and still try to keep drivers happy. There is a way to make money on every lease program. The perfect program is where the driver and the company make money. It's that simple.