Anyone here complete a Lease/Purchase with swift?

This may be a rather short thread !!!!

 

Be a company driver and save is always the best solution if bargaining power is something you want. The newer, faster truck with more freedom is a tempting thing after six months however but you just have to look at your own situation. I know a guy who is on his second lease with swift and he loves it.

 

just my 2c..

I was able to get inside a new KW last week here in PHX, and check out the inside.. wow.... ! Love that rig, the new truck smell, all the purdy guages, etc.. Instant schwiing

Just for fun, I talked to a few people about costs, yada yada.. From what I remember the Tractor runs around $120-$140K, around $879+ week truck payment (insurance, repair fund and other things i forget not included) around 3-5 years to pay off..

I'd love owning a new rig, but would rather have one that has 100K or so miles on it, all broke in, most of the new truck hiccups taken care of, etc.. Last thing id want is to be in the shop for warranty repairs, payment is still there no matter if yer rolling or not.. obviously..

Lastly IF I were to own my own tractor, id run for another Co. making more cpm..

 

I would think you would want a new truck because of the warranty coverage, especially just starting off when you don't have a maintenance account built up.

 

Makes total sence to me.. I was just going off what others had told me in the terminal the other day.

 

Honestly I don't know either, just sounded good lol.

 

There are several reasons why most lease purchase people fail. One is the cost of the lease. You cannot afford to pay out $800+/week for a truck payment and expect to make a profit. Another reason is the lack of experience. Most who become involved with these leases have little or no driving experience and NO business experience. Poor credit is another reason some get involved with a lease. Finally, most have little or no money.

It sounds tempting to be able to get into a new or near new truck with no credit check and no money down. It is like the buy here pay here car lots. You will always pay more than the truck is worth when you do a lease purchase from a carrier. Just do the math for yourself. $800/week for 5 years. That is 60 months. In addition, you will be forced to pay into a mandatory maintenance fund which may have strings attached to get any money out. Unless you complete the lease you may not be able to recover any of that money. I could go on, but the gist is that I don't see how most people can come out on a lease purchase unless you do it with an independent leasing company.

I have never done a lease purchase through a carrier. My preferred method of buying a truck is to save your money and pay cash. As a company driver you should be able to save at least $100-200/week toward buying a truck. In a year you should have saved at least enough for a good down payment. You might even be able to purchase a truck for $10,000. In any case, you should be able to save from $10-20,000 in only two years. With $20,000 I guarantee that you can pay cash for a decent truck.

If you start with a paid off truck you can always save your money and trade up in a couple of years. You won't lose as much money on depreciation with an older truck. Your lower payments (should you elect to finance rather than pay cash) will take much of the pressure off of being an owner operator.

You asked about KW's. My advice is to not worry about buying a KW, especially a W900. Not only will you pay more for the truck, but it will also cost more to run it. If you ask around you will likely find that most who own them do good to get 5 mpg. A good aerodynamic truck should get around 6.5-7 mpg. If you drive 2,500 miles per week you will buy 500 gallons of fuel at 5 mpg. At 6.5 mpg you will buy 385 gallons of fuel to run those same miles. At $4/gallon that means that it will cost you $460 more per week to run the W900. Since most don't run 52 weeks per year, I will only calculate the fuel for 50 weeks. It will cost you approximately $23,000 more per year for fuel to run the W900 than an aerodynamic truck. You could buy another truck with the savings.

It is your money. You are free to spend it any way you wish. From your post I assume that you are new to this business. There is nothing wrong with owning a KW or Peterbilt. You will pay a price. Both are great looking trucks with a solid reputation. You need to decide if you want to look cool or make money. A KW or Peterbilt will not make any more money than any other brand. You can buy a new or newer truck with big payments and have the new truck smell or buy a good used truck and then go to an auto parts store and get the "new truck smell spray" for about $2.

One mistake many newbies make is to get more truck than they can afford. You cannot afford to lease a truck from one of these carriers if you expect to pay your bills. You can make monthly truck payments for about what they will charge you each week. Granted, you may have a newer truck (for a while), but you will be working to pay for the truck. The biggest truck payment that I have EVER had was $1,200/month. I never want another truck payment. If I do decide to buy more trucks then I will most likely pay cash. I just don't like having big payments. In case you missed an earlier post, I saved my money and paid cash for my first truck and trailer.

As you look into any lease purchase program, you need to sit down and take an objective look at their program. If you have never owned a truck you won't be aware of all the costs involved in ownership. When you lease one of these trucks you don't own it, but do have all the costs associated with ownership. Before you sign any contract to lease or buy a truck you should understand what it will cost you to operate that truck. There is much more than fuel and payments to consider. You will break down, whether the truck is new or used. Expect it and plan accordingly. You will blow tires. Even new tires can blow. Most of the time tire manufacturers will not stand behind commercial tires. Plan to spend at least $300-350, even on national account. If you cannot buy on national account you can spend over $500 for a tire. That doesn't include the cost of road service if you cannot get to a tire store or truck stop. I usually spend at least $200-300+ for road service. Some will argue that with a new truck they will have a warranty. That may be true, but just because you have a warranty doesn't necessarily mean that the repairs will be covered. If they are covered, you could be required to pay for the repairs and get reimbursed by your dealer. If your truck needs to be towed, you may also need to pay that out of your pocket and it will probably NOT be included in any warranty. Nor will the lost revenue while the truck is in the shop. If you purchase a more affordable truck then you won't need to worry so much about missing a payment.

I have owned trucks for many years. I have probably had about everything happen to my trucks over the years. I have had to replace clutches, transmissions, turbo's, engines, rears, etc., I keep my trucks up and will still have something break or fail from time to time.

I would encourage you to get a notebook and keep track of everything that you have done to the truck you are driving. Check with the shop to see what it costs for those repairs. It could cost less for your company to get repairs than it would were you an owner operator. Major fleets can sometimes negotiate lower labor rates due to their volume. Track costs for at least 1 year. At the end you might be surprised at what your company has spent. I would include fuel, oil and any other costs associated with running your truck. I don't think that anyone should buy a truck until they have at lease 2 years driving experience. By that time, you will have a better idea of what is involved in running a truck, providing you have been paying attention.

 

Talked to a Swift guy the other day that was on his third lease =0

My mentor completed his lease and got into another one while I was with him.

And although I haven't been leasing with Swift all that long, it seems like a good program so far.
From what I can tell, you can actually save $$ getting a new truck over getting a used one once you factor in repairs, down time due to repairs, MPG, truck devaluation etc etc