Can somebody please help me stay motivated?

Without knowing your particulars, I would sell the truck, rent out your trailer and get a company job. That said, I was doing dry van also and was barely making it and was not motivated. I wanted to go back to flatbed as I enjoy the work and now I can actually ink out a profit. So you could also look into reefer or flatbed work. Dry van is tough right now.

I think your truck is going to sink your ship with a paccar engine. Leasing onto a company and selling your trailer will just delay your eventual death. I highly doubt you can make more money leased on then with your own numbers. Leased on companies usually don’t keep you busy enough. Note I’m generalizing and you might find a unicorn.

 

I know this question may upset some.... During the covid era with eleventy billion dollars per mile rates, by any chance did you set any of that money aside for a rainy day? Doesn't appear so...

 

Honestly man you should have made so freaking much money as your timing getting in was perfect. You should have already upgraded to brand new stuff and have money in the bank to weather this storm.

Trucking goes through ups and downs, you started during the biggest up we’ve ever seen, it only makes sense to see the biggest down we’ve ever seen.

Seriously, a 10k or 15k repair bill is breaking you? Give up now my man. Look to folks like @Siinman as he’s done it right and is cruising ahead after taking advantage of the opportunity.

You either overspent or pissed money away. Or, I suppose both.

 

Stop paying the insurance, any memberships, and equipment payments. Put the authority on hold and sell the trailer asap.
Then fix the truck and sell it asap. Payoff your remaining debt.
Go back to a company driving, think about what went wrong, learn from your mistakes before
your next try. Good luck.

 

Not sure what your average yearly maintenance cost has been since you started but mine was 20-25K a year. I am gonna guess you got lucky and did not have that happen to you in the beginning. And since it did not happen you did not realize a used truck will be a regular 20-25K year maintenance issue. So let's start at that first. Can you make that happen with what you are making off of your loads and still put some money back?

If your answer is no I would go ahead and get all your equipment sold while it is still kind of worth something. I believe the market has not hit rock bottom yet but will this year by the end of the year. We will have a little bump I hope this summer and then it will hit rock bottom and stay for a year I would guess. Hopefully I am wrong but if not you better have a plan to make it work if you want to keep in business.

If you can do that then go for it and start putting together some good weeks right away. If you know an area that pays start there and get back to that area. No reason to keep driving around if you don't know the market! The good news is you sound like if you sell out now you will be ahead and can work for someone else and pay the bills.

 

20-25k in yearly maintenance is not bad for an old truck, the real killer is downtime

 

Even with less volume that's not an exuse for these crappy rates.
If ALL drivers would refuse hauling cheap rates then we'd all be in better shape.

Once a few dummies haul loads for fuel money and a roller dog it's all over. Brokers get word of it and push rates down for the rest of us saying if you don't haul it someone else will.

 

I nominate you to put together a nationwide trucker's strike.