Future plans.

Good question, well it depends on a lot of things, one is what truck and engine but overall I like to keep worst case scenario amounts in the bank, not in a credit card.

You always have to answer to someone, having answer to a boss may be easier than answering to a dot enforcement officer.

 

Or the customer, the receiver, the tax man, the insurance company, the wife, the bank...... the list is endless. Owning a business creates more bosses than you have as an employee.

 

I was also thinking that every last decision falls on your shoulders. There is nobody to rely on, blame, or deflect to. I remember especially back in my 20’s that it was sometimes hard to have these burdens. It hardens you pretty quickly if you survive it. It’s my feeling that to have a successful business then you better be a natural sort of leader.

I’ve been in business 13 yrs now and I was telling my wife just a couple days ago that I wish I had as much emotion as I did when I was younger. This stuff just hardens you and takes it out. When I was a kid I always wondered why my Dad never cried. How is that possible? He would only choke up ever if it was about me. I find myself the same way now at just 36 and with my little boy.

You ever saw the original making of the movie Red Dawn? When the two brothers are out in the field looking across the mountains and talking. Matty says to Jed “ Your running a little short on feelings aren’t you”? Older brother Jed immediately says “Cant afford em”. LOL.

That is trucking in the long term.

 

Be careful..... I'm 20 years ahead of you, and I've worked hard to move past that point and when someone disappoints me in business, I feel it. I've learned (the hard, way, I should add) to not take it personal, but you can't let the business replace your humanity. Age has lowered expectations, added (I like to think) wisdom, but when my sense of right and wrong is violated, it still hurts. But that's better than feeling nothing......

 

Or - low debt/income. We went that route.

Saved and paid cash on truck $12,500
Financed trailer $30k new
Almost no personal debt or mortgage

Relied on $25k available credit lines as back up.

 

That says a lot. I think that some people are born leaders/business owners, and others are born employees. You can make one be the other, and vice versa. My last day at my regular job was this past Friday. I had been there a little over 9 years. I was in business for myself before that, and every day that I worked was with the intention to once again work for myself.

 

If we had some political stability but I am as others are worried we are going to see interest rates go up and inflation to follow, so to rely on credit alone or to fill major funding gaps could sink a new operation.

 

I like to keep 25k. If I need to rebuild an engine it's about 20k for a dd15. I would use my credit cards to fix the truck and pay them down after words. The 25k, I would use to live off of. Cash is king, you can go destroy your credit and still have a roof over your head and food with cash.

I had transmission issues put 7k on the card, shop work, hotel, rental car. 2 months later paid it off.

 

None of my business, but if it sounds like you already have lots of contacts in the construction world, I don't see why you'd want to go and sign on to some other outfit to run under them.