Owner operator of a large box truck or straight truck possible?

Once you start driving a semi feels like a car and a car feels like a go cart with no mirors. I feel more comfortable driving my semi then my car now. You wont be used to it at first, but big is not always scarier or worse.

 

I drive a st8 truck and do very well as an exediter. I run solo, have a nice size sleeper and am very comfortable. My target running time is out 3 weeks then home for 1. But as I live in Tn and live close to some of our customers, some weeks I get home every weekend.



Also I have found this is the best running area for a solo driver

 

Is that a class 8 rig you're running?
Dave

 

It's a class 7 truck but has a Cat C9 @335 hp, which is really a small class 8 engine.

 

Is Ny / NJ a good area to make a good profit? Im starting a co and worried a tad bit myself

 

Wait, You own a landscaping company and I know that you have other costs than just labor, there is no way that you actually think that fuel is the only cost in trucking.

10 to 15 cents per mile for Maintenance ( increases with age of truck)

10 to 15 cents per mile for Purchase of a Truck ( I do this per mile because the value of your truck drops with every mile) If you buy a used truck for 35K you can expect 200 to 300K miles out of it.

If you are talking about a 24 ft Straight truck I seriously doubt that there is any way that you will get near 15mpg even if you have a brand new unit. I figure from 6 to 9 miles per gallon. The better mileage the newer the unit and that increases your per mile purchase price.

Cost of fuel fluctuates greatly across the country. here in Texas, I get diesel for 2.65 - 2.80 but in other states, I have seen it at 3.20 recently.

Insurance for a new startup is high estimate 1300 per month on a 24ft, for unlimited miles. If you limit to 750 miles you can get it cheaper maybe as low as 900 per month if you have good credit.
Licencing and permitting - DOT 300 application fee, MC Authority 300 Application fee, BOC-3 depends on what company you use and how many states you want to work in, let's say 100 per year. There are a whole host of other expenses that I either can't think of or haven't found out about yet.

One of the biggest hidden costs and the most unpridectable is DEADHEADING. Unloaded miles to make a pickup cost you almost as much as loaded miles and until we learn when and where to avoid going it could be a fairly large percentage of your mileage. I have 20% figured as deadhead miles.

Then you have Hotel and meals and the various other travel expenses because there are not a lot of 24 ft trucks under CDL class out there and if you do find one you need to rais that per mile purchase price because they are not going to be cheap.

To make a decent profit I figure I need to average 1.50 per mile at least for the first 2 years. After 2 years I will be out of the "New Entity" insurance market and can shop for better insurance rates.