Being an owner operator do or dont

SURELY YOU JEST you gotta be nuts

 

I agree with almost everything Southernpride said. Asit pertains to an O/O.

Old is fine as long as the one driving it is the one responsible for repairs.

However as far as having 5 tracters that old and being able to find drivers that down beat them, my hats off to you. In the past 3 years I have seriously upgraded my fleet with extremely low miles on them. My profitability has increased a great deal even though my fixed overhead has gone up.

For me hiring company drivers I have found that around 1.2 million miles my old trucks hit a point where they are no longer profitable. in other words i am putting more money into repairs and lost revenue for downtime than what I have to spend to get a newer rig.

However I run Frieghtshakers, so the entire truck is coming apart by then not just the large ticket items.

Also the first truck I had was a Frieghtliner 1980 cabover with a cummins big cam II. When I gave that away and bought a Fld120 with a Series 60 detroit I saved more than the payment in Fuel saving alone.

As far as making it as an O/O your #### right you can make it. You just need to be hard headed, work hard, and never make the same mistake twice.

Good luck

 

20 grand down??:, I bought an '04 Frhtlnr Columbia this summer for $19,500.00. (and paid cash) Why, because it was a decent price, truck prices are down, and I do not have to run 130K miles and sweat to make it. Before that I had a '96 FLD, paid $10,620.00, Before that, a Volvo for 15K. They served me well. I do not have to have a big flashy truck and the stress involved to be a big time owner/op. Part of running smarter is to know your limitations and have realistic expectations and ideas. I will not trade this truck, I will run the heck out of it until I find another cheap throw away truck. I have had Pete's, loved 'em, but I find that I don't have to work as hard with this truck as I used to.
I do not buy new trailers either, you can get a way better deal on late model used trailers. Unless you have a stash of cash, its gonna be too hard to make new equipment profitable....
I also haven't found any company worth leasing too either...
I find the pay as you go method to work best for me....keeps me out of trouble......

 

i likes the way he thinks

 

Very well put. Why work your hind end off to pay payments and insurance when you could just pocket that money instead??

 

miconn, did i read somewhere that you did the jb hunt power only? did you make anything doing that? ive considered doing it, i have my authority but dont have a trailer right at the moment. thanks

 

Rebel,
I did, then a "friend" of mine talked me into coming over and hauling containers for him. Big mistake, I ended up, while still leased to his company, hooking back up to my trailer and hitting the road on my own again. I am now back to hauling JB freight. It is working for me. I have been averaging about 50 miles deadhead, and $1.45 to $2.00 a loaded mile. If you are used to doing the company thing, but want to be your own boss, its not a bad program. They will try to talk you into a mileage rate, do not do it, it obligates you to a forced dispatch. I work the percentage angle. If I dont like the average cpm, I refuse the load. This usually works into a renegotiation (sp??) of the rate. I did a Pain in ##### load this past week, did not like the rate, the restrictions, or the details of the load. Told them to find something else. They called me back, offered more money, less restrictions, and I averaged $2.01 a mile. Then a 30 mile deadhead, D/H load, dropped on another JB yard 317 miles away(because I didnt want to go into New York for the weekend) , paid me $1.66 cpm.
After dealing with some of the brokers and load boards, I am quite satisfied with this. Oh yeah, you pull their trailers, you can get 50% advance upon load confirmation, and the rest in a 48 hour Quick Pay (1.5% fee).
In essence, you can survive with this if you give it a chance. Also, for those of you that may be wondering, I am not a recruiter, an employee, or whatever. Mater of fact, I used to be Chicken Hauler. Never thought I'd be hauling for JB, but it is working for me. I am surviving here.......

 

So micoon, are leased on to JB or are do you have your own authority and pull for JB? If your leased on what is their requirement on the age of the truck.

 

sorry. didn't mean to miss-spell your s/n

 

Why be a O/O and buy a truck you hate? Guess to some guys it's just about the money. I guess I'm one of the few who likes his big flashy truck, isn't that one of the points in being a O/O? I know it is to me, I'm not going to ever drive a vaccuum cleaner truck. But I guess like someone said I need to lease to keen or watkins shepard cuz reefer don't pay ####.