Landstar home time

Just starting out anywhere you're not going home for 2wks., unless you have major money banked, and if you do why buy a truck? Just a question to the op. It is your choice though

 

What he said.

 

And. What he said.

 

STOP THE PRESS!!! You were a company driver....maybe a good one at that. However being an owner operator is about running a business. DO he hard work and learn. Being a company driver and picking up advice or listening to the truck stop lunch counter trolls is not learning.

Banging on a calculator while you were a company driver thinking you have it all figured out doesnt work either.

I know that Letstruck.com Overdrive.com and OOIDA.com have great resources.

Do the hard work first. If not you will fail.

 

I ran the LS load board and I don't think LS has enough good paying. So maybe you do have to get in buddy buddy with an agent to get the good paying load. I never liked that idea just because now your business is relying on someone else to give you the loads. You might as well just start paying the agents off for the good paying loads. I knew a guy who got on the American Idol deal. They paid good money but he only got on because his friends was already on it. When they needed an other truck he was recommended. Those loads are never posted to the load board. So you could be a hard working driver and still fail. When I first worked for LS they had more freight. You could wait till Friday afternoon because someone would need a load moved at the last minute and willing to pay more because it had to move. Before I quit if you did not have a load by Friday morning you were screwed. I got stuck many weekends without nothing to haul. Agents post loads that are not even real or have already been pickup and they don't take them off the load board.. I have seen and called on 10 loads on the load board that say is available. Not a single one was available. I would say today if you run for LS you have to setup your system to only run area you know agents can get you the loads. That's kind of a problem because most agents deal with small shippers because they can't cover the loads for the big shipper because LS can't force anyone to go pickup a load. The small shippers don't have the steady freight you need to keep rolling. So then you are kinda forced go out on the long runs. Then your stuck relying on the load board to get a load and those load are cheap.

 

Disregard.

 

With 1 truck and 2 trailers, if I sat home for a month, I would owe LS roughly $900.

After 3 months they might call and ask if everything is okay, and ask for some money.

I've been off a week today, but typically keep 10k on hand to 'pay' myself a wage for household bills when not working.

 

Brandt, were you pulling dry van? I wonder how flatbed or step deck might compare in their system. I sometimes pull loads brokered from Landstar, my company takes a cut, and the truck still earns at least $2 a mile. That's flatbed.

 

Wow ...

This paints a pretty dim but myopic view of ls.

Sorry but you didn't learn how to use the system and that's why people fail with ls.

You are wrong about a bunch of things but the more obvious is that agents deal with small shippers - that's pretty much wrong.

I could write a lot about how to use the system but I don't have a lot of time to thInk. The main thing to remember is a lot of us make good money and it isn't hard.

 

Man, you nailed it.
I guess I'll just find a few agents and hand em an "envelope" now n then.