Profitable # $1.30 cpm avg - 2k miles a week! - Disprove It!

Unless you intend to find shippers and broker thosse loads to other drivers you do NOT need broker authority... you need Motor Carrier (MC) authority to haul directly for a shipper yourself....

Don't get sucked into having someone do that for you... $300 and fill out this form.

https://li-public.fmcsa.dot.gov/LIVIEW/pkg_registration.prc_registration_decision

Same form for the DOT which is free.

Have you read this? http://www.thetruckersreport.com/tr...-operator/13608-so-you-want-own-your-own.html

Most of your questions about setting up your documents for OO are listed there.

 

Most reefer units are sold off at 7-10 years. Use to be you needed a trl no older then 8 years to be loaded by some brokers. Not so much anymore but could change in the future.

Reefers are expensive to operate. If the rate is good you will do fine but if the rate is poor you will do poorly.

 

I saw somewhere that CRST was paying up to $1.64cpm for o/o's. Is this true, there has to be a catch?

 

Can somebody check my newbe math. It seems like you have to pay about $650 for all insurance and car payments. Then there is gas and maintainence which is a variable. Gas is about .45cpm and maintence is about .10cpm. Together there is a .55cpm variable.

So the magic formula is:

$650(each week) +
$.55(variable costs, amount of miles) -
(your CPM rate $1.10 ~ $1.30, amount of miles) =
$Profit

 

is your 650 # per week or per month.

 

While you guys argue and theorize about all the pit falls of owning your own truck.. the guys that are making the money and keeping it are not on chat boards but are out there doing the deeds.

Just like any other business.. owning a truck is not for everyone. If you don't have the mindset to be a manager at work or the mindset to run your own expenses at home.. owning a truck isnt for you.

Real businessmen dont ask others how they think they'll do and what they think the negatives are because for all you know you're asking someone questions who themselves are probably afraid of doing business or have done it and have failed so why would you get anything positive out of them.

Every business has its negatives and its positives. If you're afraid to invest.. then you're not made to be a successful businessman because any real businessman that has made it out there will tell you that fear never was their companion when they started. It was just the drive to do what they liked and to push at it till they succeeded.

 

each week, so around $2,600 per month.

 

One day I was talking to a Landstar OO. I was thinking about buying a truck and wanted to get as much info from this guy as possible (he had been with them for over 10 years and an OO well over 25 years.) I offered to buy his lunch if he'd spill everything he knew. One of the most important things he told me about the fear of being able to make it was this: "Just about every single company has all the same cost that you would have as an OO (truck payment, ins, fuel, taxes, maintenance, your pay, etc...) It doesn't matter if you are a company or OO driver, you are still earning all the money for that truck, and it still has all the expenses. The only difference is that at the end of the year, you either take your $50K and go home as a company driver and you are done, or you take your $50K after you've worried and dealt with paying all the expenses, taxes, maintenance, etc. and you know that you have a little more ownership over that truck each year. Once its paid for, you start paying yourself the same truck payment, and in a few years you trade your truck and the cash for a much better truck. Do this over and over and over until you move up to a brand new truck with no payments. That truck should be good for 10 years or more. Now pay yourself the truck payment into retirement. When the truck finally breaks...RETIRE!"

I should say that this was his very last run. He went over 200 miles out of route to say good bye to his favorite server at this diner. He was showing her and me his Traditional and ROTH IRA statements...it was over $400K. All from not having a $1500/mo truck payment for the last 12 years. Between his and his wife's IRAs and Social Security, he was now going to be retiring with a pay raise.

No you will not get super wealthy off of one truck, but depending how old you are and how long you want to go at it, you could use the money to pay cash for more trucks and put drivers in them. Then thats where the money comes from.

As far as the pay goes, you have to really do your homework. There is good money to be made. Dedicated tank is a good place to be if you can get on a nice set up. We go out loaded, and we have to come back empty since we are dedicated. I just dead headed over 800 miles this past Sat from Ft. Worth to central Illinois. We also do this to CA, and PA. GOOD MONEY to be made if you do your homework. A little tip, most of the good money will not be found in the truck stop recruiting magazines. Find the companies that have really nice OO trucks that are all flashy and chromed. The driver has to be making good money to have the truck all decked out. The trick is to not do that to your truck, but instead take all that extra money and build a really big emergency fund, pay off your truck early, and save it. Then when something breaks you don't have a really nice looker being repoed from your front yard as you're being forclosed on.

Hope this helps anyone in anyway!
God Bless and Good Luck!!