A little Help

Get a Lawyer involved. If your choices will not let you and your Lawyer read the Lease Purchase and Owner Op contracts before coming to Orientation, find a company that will. Of the three you mention, I know JCT will not let you do this.

 

Dont do it!!! Save your money, buy the truck yourself and then sign on with a company.

Lease purchase works to the companys advantage, not the drivers and once they have you your stuck.

 

Lets see...

Right now lease purchase is the only way you can get your foot in the door of most trucking companies. Its the new company driver for trucking companies.

You can be successful in a lease purchase, HOWEVER, the vast majority fail, so you're going to have to be smart in how you run and your load selection. They will offer you 3-4 load selections. When youre trying to figure out the money aspect, figure out the load pay, and divide it by the number of days it will take to deliver the load. You want a minimum of $500 a day gross.

Most trucking companies pay on a sliding pay scale (the longer the run, the smaller the mileage pay). Do not, I repeat, do not take a load thats over 1000 miles (deadhead plus linehaul) on any other day than Friday if youre on a sliding scale. Monday is the next business day to Friday and so even if you take a longer load, as long as it delivers on Monday, you can make it pay well on the time.
Say you have a 2000 mile load that pays 80 cpm for loads 1500 miles and longer. Pick it up Tuesday for a Friday delivery. Thats $1600/4 (Tues,Wed,Thurs,Fri)=$400 a day. Not good. But if it picked up Friday for a Monday drop, its $1600/2=$800 a day. Thats good! See how that works?

One more thing, in order for you to make a decent check to send enough money to the house and take the 4 days off for your hometime without sinking, those 3 weeks youre out, you will need to consistantly need to hit three 1000 mile loads per week.
Say the pay for a 500-1000 mile load is $1.20 a mile. If you do 3 loads, thats $1200 a load or $3600 gross, or $600 a day. Thats good. You can stay afloat even for the hometime. But you HAVE TO consistantly hit 3 loads!

Simply put, you will need to get ahead early in the week. Load early Monday, and deliver first thing Tuesday. Youre ahead for the week. Even if you have to sit a day somewheres in the week, you are still okay.

Or you can make it on the weekend. Grab a 1500 miler on Friday, get to delivery point Saturday night. Work in a 34 Sat night/all day Sun/early Mon morn, and drop it early Mon. You got fresh hours, do an overnighter Monday and are in shape for 2 more loads! Thats 4loads if you hustle($$$), 3 even if you sit 2 days that week! Yes, you can make the money without killing yourself...except on Mondays(LOL)

You have to run. You have to make sure the company youre signing with has the freight so that you can run. I like an aggressive dispatcher and aggressive dispatchers love me.

Now for the bad:

I do not like fleet trucks. Fleet trucks are the beancounters way of hurting you and the company. Lease programs are expensive! They have you paying top dollar money for a bottom of the line truck. For the same amount of money that a lease truck will cost you, you can go to your favorite truck dealership, look through their catalog, order every option you could ever imagine in a truck, set up to your personal specs, color, drivetrain, wheelbase, whatever... and come out cheaper than a lease truck. As long as you understand that. Your trucking company is not doing you ANY favors, so if some company rep makes it sound that way, tell him to cut the bull. Its like paying Steak and Ale prices for a HappyMeal.

Second, youre lease truck is not your truck. Its a company truck. When you leave the company, you leave behind the company truck. All the money that you put in the thing is moot. Its a company truck. Its not yours.. I myself cant see myself leasing a company truck from the company that I drive for. Theres a conflict of interest. Dont like it.

"But thats the only way I can get my foot in the door and I really need to work."

Understood. You can lease a truck from a company other than the one you drive for. The good thing about doing this is ITS CHEAPER than leasing it from the company that you are driving for AND you can get an owner operator spec truck. And THERES NO CONFLICT OF INTEREST!!! If you and your company part ways, the truck goes with you! No busride for you, Mister! However, these places usually require $3k-$4k down.

Can you make a lease purchase work? Yes, BUT...

-you cant be one of those drivers that has to be home every other week
-you have to roll consistantly
-freight has to be there
- your dispatcher has to show up to work. He cant sit in the office and paint his toenails
-YOU HAVE TO MANAGE YOUR TIME WELL


Happy motoring.

 

If you do go that route, I've heard good things about National Carriers. Good luck.

 

This would be a good idea. Not only too find out the "fine print" but if they say no then there is probably a reason why they don't want a lawyer reading it. On the other hand i would not recommend it but it does work for some. There are some good reviews about JCT on here and I think Central also. you will also find bad posts about them. If you can stay out for 3-4 weeks at a time then you might be ok. I definately would stay away from National Carriers i know a couple guys who went through them and really got shafted. My advice save your money buy an inexpensive truck or finance an inexpensive truck and get your own authority or leas on with a 100% Owner Operator company. Good Luck

 

I've heard good things about JCT. If you can be patient for a few months they'll help you get into a truck you like. The first couple of months you'll probably be in an older truck, but the payments will be low so you can get things rollin' before getting into a newer truck with higher payments. The other two companies you mentioned will have large balloon payments at the end of your lease if you want to purchase the truck. JCT will let you have the truck for $1. Produce is moving pretty good out of California right now, and I know JCT runs in and out of CA, so you shouldn't have any problem getting miles with JCT.