Good Night From II

I thought you had to have a year experience before you can even sign up to be a LO?

 

I believe it's six months.

 

Taking my break at the Peelot in Tulsa. What a dump. Was sleeping soundly till some person from Central Refrigerated parked next to me and left their dog in the cab to bark and WAIL at the top of his lungs!! I have dogs but I can't handle the non stop anxiety attack this guys dog is having. Went inside to eat and sure hope this person is back by the time I'm done so the dog will chill.

Got my CHEP pallets unloaded this morning in Kansas City then headed straight to the next shipper to P/U. Drove the 4hrs to Tulsa to set my 10 for an early morning unload. After that, have a ppln to P/U a preloaded trailer a few miles away to take to Cheyenne. Delivers Friday morning so I'm hoping to get something outta there going east quickly. Hoping!!

 

psshhh ... The years experience is good for only couple if things, alibi very important things ... do you like being a truck driver or at least can you deal with it and can you get the miles you need to successfully run a business ... beyond that the only thing you've learned, is to be a company driver. If you don't know how to run a business, driving a truck for a year isn't going to teach you.

And get over the equity thing ... a truck is a depreciating asset - a capital expense not a capital investment, it has no equity. The only thing it has is an ever decreasing salvage value.

 

very true, its like the restaurant business, nothing is worth near what you bought it for. Same as buying a car, you lose thousands in value just driving it off the lot.

 

Denalidad is not a newbie, he's been driving for several years at other companies. He has just recently returned to the Swift section of this forum.

 

Since you made this a response to a sentence in a post I made, I had a long response written. However, it was too emotional and probably would have drawn unwanted attention to me. I don't tolerate arrogant, hauty responses like this very well. Let me just say these few things:

You know very little, if anything, about me, my skillset, my abilities, my background and education, or my driving experience. Therefore, you do not have the right to make judgements about me. And using those huge red letters makes you seem desperate for some reason.

Please stop. If you don't want to lease, don't. I support your choice. Stop yelling at me because you don't like mine.

Oh, one more thing. I have more experience than you do.

 

One final note:

If this is the kind of experience you've had in your first year, you either were not well trained or did not pay attention to your trainer. None of them happened to me in my first year...or since. You should not become a trainer.

 

Ms Jamie,

I'm going to have to agree with denalidad. If you don't think leasing will work for you then by all means don't lease, but seeing as you have ZERO experience in the matter I would warn others to take what you say with a grain of salt.

You are regularly preaching all over this site against leasing and it has become mildly annoying. I understand that you have a strong opinion about it, and you are entitled to your opinion. But you must understand that your words on this subject carry no weight with me and I'm sure many others as well.

There are a few succesful L/O here in this very thread (myself included). I also know of some that leased early in their career. Steve leased at six month exp. if I'm not mistaken. I leased early as well and I have been doing very well, in fact I will be getting a second truck next week.

That being said, neither mine nor Steve's experience can neccissarily be considered typical. But if you have the business know-how and you are a fast learner and don't run your truck into everything you see, then you may very well have the recipe for success.

I will add that I did have experience running a business before I started trucking so that has helped. But I don't have an MBA nor any college degree. It is not easy but it is also not impossible. From my experience it is not even improbable.

If you never decide to lease, I would never hold it against you- to each their own. But if you do decide I would recommend seeking the advice from those of us on this site that have experience in this matter and hope that you haven't burned any bridges. I have no hard feelings for you as I can see that you just feel strongly about your opinion, you just present it the wrong way. If you ever want advice I will offer it.

 

Taking my break at a Loves somewhere in western KS on I-70. Wanted to make Limon CO tonight but my live unload first thing this morning took 5.5hrs ripping my 14. Got jacked pretty good by the receiver wasting my morning.

Moved on to my next load from Tulsa to a Cheyenne Walmart DC. Quick and easy d/h at the shipper. I love getting loads there cuz I'm always in and out in 30mins. Dropping in Cheyenne tomorrow around lunch. Sure hope I get a ppln to get outta there quickly. Hopefully won't involve going to Denver either.