Is It a Good Time To be an Owner Operator

Discussion in 'Canadian Truckers Forum' started by Steve A, Jul 7, 2019.

  1. mudflap77

    mudflap77 Heavy Load Member

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    South western Ontario
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    Lease to own- bad bad bad.
    As far as becoming a o/o tough times are the perfect time. If you can pencil it and make it work in the hard times are golden in the good times. Right now a lot of O/Os that jumped in in the last 18 months are finding out they can't make the payments that looked so easily achievable a year ago. Just my thoughts
     
    crankit2152 and BigHossVolvo Thank this.
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  3. Zeviander

    Zeviander Road Train Member

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    wow.gif
     
  4. BigHossVolvo

    BigHossVolvo Road Train Member

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    Yessir! not the first time I've seen this happen either. When I was at Bison, an O/O had one of his drivers abandon a truck at the truckstop in Blaine WA and walk across the border, got in a Taxi and went home. A different Bison O/O had his driver steal the truck/loaded trailer, park it in an abandon barn near Tilly AB, cut the GPS on both the truck/trailer; took them 2 months to find it.

    The all time MVP tho, was the Bison OOD (Owner Operator Driver), who drove the truck into Mexico and disappeared. They found the truck in a dealership in Mexico City, and years later the guy got caught for immigration charges, for working illegally in a resort in Cancun.
     
  5. Snow Monster

    Snow Monster Medium Load Member

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    Lease to own?

    Give your head a shake young man, shake it long and hard, until you get a big headache, get that thought right out of your head!

    It's not a scam according to law, they're just selling dreams that have a very slim chance of becoming a reality, and it's been going on since the early 1980's as I recall.

    Had a neighbour that was a 10 year driver at one company, until one day he figured he knew enough about trucking to be an O/O and leased a truck from that company.
    He was done as an O/O in short time when he figured out he was making a lot less money as his own driver and went back to being a company driver, took him a while, but he finally did.
    The owner operators in the fleet who arranged their own finances and truck purchases did quite well though.

    It was a large Canadian carrier at one time with many terminals between Quebec and the west coast.
    They opened one of the first carrier owned and operated driving schools, of which many of the students were sponsored by the government, (free money), they got to cherry pick the best students for their own fleet, they owned a truck dealership with a leasing division in Ontario and offered up a lease to own deal to anyone and everyone, as well as selling and leasing trucks to themselves and customers not associated with the trucking company, and the tax write offs and credits, oy vey........, the pencil pushers must have been working overtime figuring out what to do with all that money!

    Now that's a scam!
     
    Last edited: Jul 10, 2019
  6. Zeviander

    Zeviander Road Train Member

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    I've only been in the trucking industry for 4 years now, but I haven't heard anything like that, wow.
     
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  7. uncleal13

    uncleal13 Road Train Member

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    I’m making my all time best money doing regional. Home occasionally through the week, every weekend home.
    A friend did 14 years city work only as a O/O leased to a carrier. Had the same truck the whole time. Wasn’t great money, but the family time was important to him. Now he is in the office at the same company doing recruiting.
     
  8. BigHossVolvo

    BigHossVolvo Road Train Member

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    I've never heard of it happening with Tanker, Deck, Heavy Haul, or Intermodal. Its almost always 99.9% Tandem Dry Van/Reefer Mega Carrier/Medium Size Companies, that allow the O/O's to build small fleets and find drivers.

    Out of that 99.9%, I would say its 90% Van guys and 10% Reefer that pull stunts like this.

    This is why i'm getting out of Tandem Van/Reefer General Freight all together, LTL Van is a little better, but at the end of the day; It truly is the lowest of the low.

    Dedicated Account, Specialty Hazmat LTL, here I come!
     
  9. Kw Owners Club

    Kw Owners Club Bobtail Member

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    Jan 1, 2019
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    It's hard enough to make money as a real owner operator,lease purchase is a scam and you wont be an owner operator,either stay company driver and keep all your money in your pocket and have 0 stress or save all your pennies in a sav8ngs account til you can afford to buy a truck cash and then you can't fail cus your can't lose your truck.A lease purchase is like having a 400 credit score and getting a loan at 30-40% interest,you CAN do it but nobody who is sane would ever do it.......you'll pay 150k for a 30k truck and give all your profit to that company and they can screw you any day they want......insanity.
     
  10. El Tigre

    El Tigre Bobtail Member

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    Jul 29, 2019
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