3 yrs exp, but left trucking 4 yrs ago making $120K+, where do I pick up?

dca, I have determined I want to do solo driving. One thing I learned when I was with england is the solo driver gets shafted. No way in the world would I go to CRE as a solo. Their pay is terrible. To me CRE is a good starter company, but not a place I would ever go if I wanted to be solo.

I'm just gonna ignore they haters, as there seems to be some in this thread. I guess they are the same ones that call BS to the oversized haulers making $300K a year, and so forth... I have explained myself very thoroughly on how I made $120K+ a year. It's not easy, but it's possible. I even told them how I did it, even that isn't good enough. I'm done with that.

I have looked into the few companies that were mentioned in this thread, Frey, Henderson, Trimac, and Con-way. I talked to a con-way recruiter earlier today since ran many con-way loads with England, and she told me 0.38 a mile, with 1800-2200 miles a week, I did the math and thats a little over $800 a week before deductions. Didn't know con-way paid so little, well I shouldn't say little, just not as much as I imagined.

So it seems, I won't be able to break $100K unless I train again, but I don't want to train. That stuff takes its toll on a person. So I have adjusted my expectations, and reasonably, someplace where I can make $50K-$65K if I really ran hard, and they paid pretty decent. I don't care about miles, because I can dictate my own miles if I can get to a good company and do most of my DM's job for him, and possibly even pre-book my own loads.

I just don't want to be on the road for more than two years at most. I have never done solo driving before, because to be honest, I would have sunk like the titanic at CRE doing that. I have many friends and students fail miserably at becoming a lease solo driver. They barely made $300-$500 a week doing it, before they almost always quit. So yes, I know the traps that England lays as far as solo driving goes. The only solos at england I knew personally, were the owner-ops. And that's only because they didn't have a $3000 truck payment over their head each and every month.

 

Ya, exactly, gross and net are two different things on average I grossed right around $260K my second year, and $270K my final year more or less, but I only netted a little over $120K and $140K my 2nd and 3rd year, so right under 50% seems to be about right based on my personal experience.

I remember a month after I became a lease operator, England announced all lease trucks would be limited to 67MPH. Thank god I got mine 1 month before, and could go 75MPH. You will be surprised how much something this miniscule added to my bottom line. I also drove 7 miles over the speed limit always. Only states I took no chances in were Cali and Oregon. Seen too many trucks pulled over in those states, so would only go 2 miles over.

I also got high 6's sometimes 7mpg as I had a 2009 Volvo. And I rarely idled. I was very good on keeping my overhead as low as possible. I am sure the trucks now probably get even better mileage than that now. I now I have been seeing wings on the back of trailers these past few years or so, I imagine to boost mpg, and improve their bottom line.

One thing I hated was driving on I-80. I would love to just run I-40 or I-20 coast to coast all day long. Seems finding the right company is harder than I thought. I have been googling and reading so many forum threads, and my god, so many horror stories.

Which is why I am taking a little extra time to find the right company, before I head over to them and do the orientation and refresher. I don't want to waste 6 months with a crappy company, then go to another company, and another, and so on.... So many companies, yet very few that have positive things posted about them.

It would be nice if I could get into UPS somehow, but I don't think they would hire me atm.They were the one company who's drivers I would talk to at the truck stop, and almost every UPS driver I ever spoke with always had the best things to say about the company.