6 months experience only. Can I be o/o?

Anyone can be an O/O, BUT that doesn't mean they will be successful. I'd suggest if you're seriously interested in it, figure out what you want to haul and what types of trailers you want to pull and start looking for places wanting O/Os and go speak with them about their contracts. Remember as an O/O you get to negotiate your own contracts and all too often new O/Os sell themselves short which costs them money in the long run. From what I have been told at the current market rate, you shouldn't be making any less than $1.50 per mile but aim for $2-$3 per mile. Best advice I can give you is to speak to as many O/Os you can and gather as much information as possible about their successes and their failures. Most O/Os will be more than willing to talk to you as they don't want to see anyone fail and fall flat on their face.

 

Absolutely

 

Why not wait awhile, gain more experience, and get a better idea of what it takes to be an OO?
Driving the truck is the easy part.
Finding good paying loads, learning how to spend and manage your money, learning to work on your truck yourself as much as possible, and knowing how to manage your time are important. More than that, they're necessary to survive.
You'll need to know about licensing, insurance, IFTA, drug testing, scheduling your tax payments, and depreciation.
There's more, a lot more, but that's for openers. Nobody, absolutely nobody, cares whether you make it or not.
The "good old days" of just buying a truck and working hard are gone forever. If a guy isn't at least fairly good as a businessman he's not going to make it.
Trucking...especially as an OO...has one of the highest initial failure rates of any business. There's a message there.

 

I'm blown away.

I thought you were a republican.

Kudos for being "woke" tho...

 

Trucking is just a industry.. Running a business is a whole diffrent matter. Do you have any sort of business experance? If you do then its not as big of a hurdle to run your own truck and just learn the trucking side.

On the other hand, if you have never run a business and are still learning trucking then I'd say you should wait and save, save, save.. (if you can't save now, you shouldn't even try to run a business)

As a side note I see everyone saying insurance will be the killer, but they are just looking at OO as being a guy with his own numbers. You don't have to jump that deep right at the start..

You can buy a truck and lease it on to another company using their numbers and insurance. Don't mistake leasing on as leasing a truck from someone.. It's 2 diffrent things, but that is the much simpler and cheaper way to start out as a owner it also grants a bit of a safety blanket.

Having your own numbers doesn't have to be the end goal. Leasing your truck on to another company and hauling their freight can make you good money and be a lot less headache.

 

One loooong question I should of asked... as a current team driver at Schneider are you running a lease or are you both company drivers paid by the mile?

If you are lease.. how much is your truck earning per week and how much are your expenses. Ie whats your weekly profit. Once you know your average weekly profit, how much more will you make per week if you are using your truck vs theirs? Once you know that, then you need to figure out how much your truck will cost to operate vs running theirs.. last is how much diffrence is there in profit running your truck vs theirs?

 

I would not suggest trying to enter ANY occupation as a business owner after only six months on the job.

I am hesitating to do it now, after two years in the business.

If you really, desperately want to own your own truck, maybe try it after a year.

If you absolutely want to stop being a company driver today, look into a lease operator program, preferably a walk-away lease, and sign on for 2 years.

After 2 years as a lease operator, going o/o would not provide you nearly as many ugly surprises.

 

Hey I have some money burning a hole in my pocket, maybe I should become a business owner. What do you guys all think?

Is it to early or should I wait a week?

 

@yzar78 you are not serious right?
Tell me am I ready?
You should know if you are or not. If you have any doubt about certain thing or area there is answers everywhere and you ll be surprised how much you can learn. I hope you didnt listen them. Idk how can someone say to another person you arent ready based just on a hunch.
Confidence and knowing what you dont know is the key man