Should I even think about being an O/O?

paging @Bakerman @Dave_in_AZ

 

To make decent money you will have to be out two-three weeks at a time. Phoenix is not a good area for freight.

 

I know @Dave_in_AZ is leased onto Landstar and is running regional, as he needs to stay close to home. I have my own customers that I deliver to & pick up from LA every week. These are customers that I have built up & come to know over the past 20 years.

You will most likely need to find your niche or lease onto a big carrier and stay regional.
@boneebone is also based in the LA area but only travels regionaly leased onto Swift.
Just need to find your grove and go for it.

 

Sure could I know some o/o who are home weekends and still take home higher than average pay checks.

 

Its all about who you know. My dad is leased to a small company that pretty much does day runs. (100-400mi a day) mix of van and flats and makes out pretty decent for most part. 3000 a wk after fuel most weeks with low operating costs. M-f weekends off

 

Phoenix is very poor for freight. You will have to go to Nogales to fetch Produce to Load or even to Yuma to do it.

Otherwise it's west coast for freight east.

 

Just came out of the Phoenix area . Not a lot of Dry van freight moving out , got lucky and grabed a load back to Tx at a decent rate but I feel lucky I was able to get out of there.

 

I use to run long haul vans, owner operator.
Net after all expenses varied between $30-50,000 a year depending on the company I was running for. Only home four or five days a month.
Now I run what I call super-regional. 90 % of my runs are within a three hour radius. Occasionally going a full day's drive away. Home every weekend and sometimes during the week. Last five years I've ranged net after all expenses between $80-105,000 a year depending on how much time off I take. ( Went to Australia for 23 days this year ).
Get a truck and find an outfit that suits your lifestyle. They are out there. Or do your own thing.

 

When you're an oo, you can't just choose where to run. The market dictates where you run. Else you'll fail. I live in Detroit / Flint market and it kinda sucks for freight in the summer. Hard to get $2/mi off the board to anywhere but Northeast. And of course $2/mi to the Northeast is terrible.

I'd love to run to AZ. But freight rarely pays even $2/mi there from the east, and from looking at the board, choices can be very thin from Phoenix. There might NOT be a load coming back east. So since I get laughed at when I quote $3-$3.25/mile to.go there, I just don't.

I got lucky once and took a 2800 mile run to Seattle for $2.75/mi on a light load, and was lucky to get $1.50 to Denver and extremely lucky to get $1.40 to MS from there.
That just doesn't typically happen.

If I lived in Phoenix, I'd probably still be sitting there waiting for a load out because I won't take $1/mile.

I try to stay in higher demand areas and occasionally Branch out into worse areas when they decide to open their wallets a little. But living in MI doesn't give me many options unless I want to go to Grand rapids or Toledo but even then it's not nearly as bad as having to find a load out of Phoenix every time I come back from home time. I don't know how you'd do it off load boards. You'd never get to come home without taking a loss.