Some numbers for new O/O

I think something my father told me 3 decades ago applies here: "listen more, talk less".

 

God gave us 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason.

 

Not exactly, if you incorporate, your wages are an expense to the company. Profit would be if you pay yourself by dividends, which is an option, but a bit complicated. I pay myself as a salary and simply deduct it as a business expense (with all the payroll expenses as well.) If you're a sole proprietorship, you take a draw from the business. That's also an expense, but it doesn't include the same taxes because there is no separation between personal and business entity. I don't know when salary would be "profit" other than as a dividend from a corporation and then only for taxation reasons, but for accounting it would still be an expense. You might want to review your understanding of business accounting. Something is missing here.

 

Lots of great points being made.

From my perspective I'd choose used over new. And I wouldn't choose any used truck either. This aspect alone could and should take some time.

Now my background is a bit different than the masses only because of freight types. In car hauling you do start on boards but it's so easy to build repeat business if you understand the niche.

However, I'd agree the 5 day thing can make any niche harder than could be if stayed out longer. Maybe even a different schedule type. For myself during just before spring for one example. I would stay out for the entire mo.

Did this a few times throughout each year. For winter season itself I wouldn't stay out for longer than 12-14 days with 3-4 days off between, sometimes 5 days off. This goes along the lines of knowing your lanes, rates, the time of season, etc.

My last truck was taken from me before I could pay it off because I was buying it from a small transport company where the company owner ended up convicted of embezzlement and a handful of other things. The contract I had in place was deemed as a sham contract. The 65k I paid in didn't matter since it wasn't his truck to sell to me. Took him to court, won but jail birds are broke.

Only saying all this to help anyone looking into buying. Do ALL your research, being buddies with the lawyer that is also buddies with the seller doesn't work out. Trust me, I have exp in this.

Another topic to include many don't think about is if they ever may want to go on vacation with family, and how that itself comes as a triple cost.

 

Last week was my first week attempting long haul on the load boards. here is how I made out.

Odessa TX to Houston TX $900 at $1.8 per mile
Houston TX to Douglas WY $3300 at $2.6 per mile
200 miles empty
Kimball NE to Pecos TX $1400 at $1.75 per mile

With labor day and no one working it hurts, but overall I am happy with what I got. I don't have tarps yet, so I could have probably made more. I don't have my next load yet. I think it may involve a lot of empty miles.

 

I love numbers, can anyone tell what loadboards using a plain on 53 van is paying per mile? I keep hearing around 1.80 a mile.

 

That is a hard question to answer. Every state has different rates. A load going to Florida is probably going to pay more than 2 per mile, but you will have a hard time getting that going out. Posted two pictures from the boards so you can see what it looks like. (alabama and florida going anywhere)

I am new but I can tell you $2 a mile into Florida is probably a bad deal.

 

I hate that they are not all required to post a base rate. Total BS. What do you average over all of it?

 

If you need them to tell you what it pays, you’re gonna hate when you find out how much it costs.

 

It is hard to say if seeing a base rate would make it easier to get better rates from what they are now but it sure would make us feel better sometimes.