Buying a Truck

I have been looking into buying or leasing a truck. I applied with Schneider Finance and have been approved for pretty much any truck I want with no down payment. The one I am considering getting is an 06 Freightliner Century,13 speed, with a little over 600k miles. Price seems steep at 44K but it comes with a tri pak APU. For this truck I would have to pay about 2k per month for 2 years. Part of that 2k per month goes toward the warranty. At the end of two years I will owe 6k and the truck is mine. During that two years the drive train is covered by a warranty. One great thing about this is the fact that I don't have to work for Schneider, although I am considering it. I am supposed to stay with whatever company I start with, but if I do want to change companies, I will have to pay a deposit of 2400.

This seems like a pretty good deal to me. Especially considering I have very little money to start off with. If anybody has any first hand experience with buying a truck from Schneider, I would appreciate hearing about it.

They sent me me a spread sheet outling the estimated cash flow I could expect to see. It says I could clear 50k for the year working for Schneider. It is pretty detailed and covers all the expenses I should expect to see, fuel, taxes, maintenence, insurance, etc. I don't know if I am allowed to even if I could, but I would like to post it and have somebody with experience as an O/O look over it and tell me what they think of it. Or I could email it to someone if they are interested.

Any feedback would be appreciated

 

Another thing, does anybody know of any good companies to lease on to that will hire me in Oregon?

 

Does that 2,000 month include insurance? price at 2 years is 48,000 + 6,000 balloon = $54,000. Truck paper has freight. centuries ranging from 35-$40,000 (with your specs). Seems like a lot! I dont think a warranty and a used apu is worth $15,000. Overall, that truck price seems very high (as most of the company leases do, thats why they are called fleeces). The reason why they lease them instead of traditional finance is that they are not required to follow normal vehicle fiance rules, they call it a lease and they can put whatever rules theu want in the contract. Make sure you read the lease front to back or have a lawyer look at it.

I suggest buying an older model truck for half that. just do your homework on the truck- pay to have a mechanic go over it, put it on the dyno machine, etc.

Now if you dont have financing available (bad or new credit). Then I guess its your only option. You may want become a company driver and save your money to buy a used one if your credit is good. You will probably need at least 20% down at a minimum.

 

The truck is listed for 44k 24 payments of 18k + 150 for the warranty + 18 for gap protection + 6000 residual # end of lease

I just used a financing calculator program to do this math

40,000 with 0 down payment at 13% interest for 24 months =
2000 / month for a total of 48k at 16% the total is 50k
I realize that is not even a realistic way to buy a truck, but I would like to keep what little savings I have for operating expenses.

I haven't found any trucks similar to this one with an apu and a warranty for 40k. So is the APU and the warranty worth 6k? I think it is, to me anyway. I hate idling, even when I am not paying for the fuel, and I Love air conditioning. Also, I am a horrible mechanic.

I figure, I can jump into my own truck, take home company driver pay, and own a truck (hopefully it will still have some life) in two years. I have been a company driver for 5 years and all I have to show for it is barely scraping by.

Of course I will watch my #$$, haven't jumped over the cliff yet just thinking about it. On some level I really like the idea of driving MY truck.
Hope I don't do something stupid. Thanks for the warning

 

They also have a 2009 Cascadia with about 60k miles listed for 110k. I looked on truckpaper.com and this seems like a pretty reasonable price. I don't know what the payments would be and for how long. They will extend the term if I want a more expensive truck. Would it be better to own on 06 with about 850k on the odo in two years, or an 09 with about 600 - 700k in 5 years? Either way I would end up with a 5 year old truck, but the 09 would probably have less miles in the end. I'm still leaning toward the 06 since I like the idea of getting the whole thing overwith in 2 yrs.

 

$44k for a Freightliner with over 600k on it is actually not good at all. I would very strongly advise that truck sees a GOOD 3rd party mechanic and gets oil samples etc. That mileage on a fleet truck has probably had a good dozen novice drivers abusing it, and is going to be getting really tired out.

I've seen better from assorted Selectrucks locations, and you wouldn't be falling into the unpleasant situation of getting your freight from the same folks holding your truck note.

 

$2k/mo payments is way too much to be paying for that truck. Think about it: $500/week payments. Hell, I could beat that truck all day long. I could send you link after link after link of Shakers with less mileage and much much cheaper price (financing would be on your own or through a dealer).

Shoot me a pm if you would like a link or two.

 

Price is a little high on Truck Paper 06 Freightliner Century average 38k and its more than likely that what they is selling you is a out of service company truck that has been driven by quite a few driver that has a its not my truck attitude

 

Heck you can get KW or pete cheaper than that. Wayy too high for a Freightliner Century.

KH