Taking the plunge. My journey as an O/O.

Correct. It's obvious the OP is convinced, his course in the short run is established.

What I've tried to do is to lay out the numbers in a way that others who are considering going into this industry as lease/owner ops, will sit back and go, "WHOA NELLY, do I really want to do this?"

It really doesn't do any of us any good in this industry, to have the cycle repeated over and over and over again, by these guys who think they can beat the odds established by the house.

 

Exactly. The op is convinced he is on the right path. Just as much as we are convinced the numbers just don't work. All we can do is wish him well and hope he sees how wrong he is while he still has time (and money) to correct the path he had chosen.

I do like your approach of commenting not so much for the op's benefit, but for the benefit of the next 99,999 guys thinking of buying a truck and reading this thread.

I keep going back to his comments about this is a good way to learn record keeping skills. That flabbergasted me. It's like he doesn't think it's possible to do that while also getting paid a profitable rate.

 

At a $1.30 a mile average pay, even if you ran 48 full weeks at 3k miles a week (144k miles), which would be pretty tough to do in myopinion, that's gross revenue of $187,200.

Last year I made that number working 1500-2000 per week and some months I only worked 2 or 3 weeks per month . I run as less as I can . I have not contracts nor dedicated routes . I go to places where I can get the most money per miles . My round trips are mostly 3 to 4 days out of my home .
I came home last Saturday and I’m home still because, the rates are really bad. I have a truck and a reefer payment.
I know guys that make the same amount or less as L O/O or “O/O “ but they works their ### like no other and they are fixing their trucks all the time.
The point I want to make here is that know your priorities. What you do with a lots of money without free time for yourself or your family ? Or what is the point to work so hard for almost nothing in return ? And the most important thing here is that no one punish me if I don’t take a load and I don’t have to request permission to go home and spend time with my family .
Thank you to the guys that put their time in this site to give advises . I do my best to read and learn without having to experienced

 

A word of advice. Add in fsc as a separate line item revenue source and include it in all projections. It is not a reimbursement or fuel discount even if it feels like it is. Doing it any other way just over complicates things, the more complicated you make book keeping the more room for a mistake. Mistakes in bookkeeping are very expensive during an audit and in trucking an audit is a when, not an if. The irs treats fsc as income, you should do the same. I can not stress this enough.

More advice, tho this will most likely get ignored. Do not bank on 3100 miles 50 weeks a year. That will only happen if things go perfect all year long. and even if things go perfect it won't allow for any time to decompress. Burn out is a real thing and something we all need to plan for by alloting ourselves extra time away from that darn truck. An o/o needs a bit more time not driving than a company driver to take care of the business end. Things like getting book keeping in order and arranging for maintenance. If you only plan to take off the same time as a company driver you will soon find yourself not having ANY time off.

 

Your comment on FSC being shown on the books as income is spot on. I wonder if his accountant pointed that out to him?

 

If his accountant didn't, he needs a new accountant. That's basic stuff.

 

So, you've obviously had a chance to fuel using the Crete corporate discount card.

Do you have any numbers you could post on you what you paid per gallon in a given location on a given day in the past week?

 

Im a company driver for crete i was thinking about going down the same path as you are. Become o/o with crete learn how to run everything then move on to a percentage company.only thing i was going to do diffrent than you was get a truck thru lone Mountain and lease onto crete much lower downpayment than crete for same mile and spec truck and i could switch company at any time with out having to buy out. $1.30 is the highend of their pay scale (yes guys they will pay you less than that per mile) i spent 2month looking over all the numbers and there is no way to stay afloat. Itll only take 2 bad weeks to wipe out your personal savings. I just had 3bad weeks as company driver got off home time blew a steer tire out killed the rim 8hrs to fix. 4days later def pump frozed up had the truck towed 70miles to a shop down 3days then i80 shut down if i was a crete o/o i would be out of business. I hope you the best my advice would be try to plan to get the truck paided off in a year before you lose the truck and destroy your credit so you can go to a percentage company that you can be doing $1.60 a mile on a bad day.