Any of you hot shot guys at Landstar?

I noticed Landstar has hotshot drivers. I know they pull right from the regular load board, but Im curious if anyone here is running for them and if so are you staying busy?

 

Yeah honestly, I'm back and forth if I want to stay with a big rig or go hotshot. My biggest issue with hotshot, is I don't want to be out on the road making a lot less just because I'm in a smaller truck, so I was kinda curious if guys are making good money hot shotting with them. (good money to me, is me putting at least $2k in my bank for a week of driving) I don't want to go out on the road to make $1k/week for example.

I can make a lot more than that in a big rig, so I'd want to see myself making no less than $2k/week or more on average, I just don't know what these guys are actually making is the problem. ('I'm not talking $2k to the truck but to me in my bank I expect to earn roughly $300/day after expenses to be on the road or more) If I can do that hot shotting then I'm interested but I don't want to be out there making $150/day after expenses..

 

Yea, I used a mega to get my CDL (Prime) I run a lease truck and my lease is finished this January. My plan was to always run until this winter then take the winter off and decide what I was doing and then restart in the spring time once freight picks up.

My biggest issue with Hot Shots is I have no way to gauge what they are getting paid on loads. Most hot shots seem to either haul cars or flatbeds. I run a refer truck and I'm sick to death of food distribution warehouses but don't really know the flatbed or car hauling rates much less rates that hot shot trucks are getting.

Basically I'm in info gathering mode at the moment.. I'd honestly like to get away from big trucks but I don't want to take a big income drop if I do. I know hot shot will be cheaper to run so I'm ok making a bit less but I don't want to give my time away..

When you say you make $5k/week to your trucks do you have trucks leased on to Landstar or you running your own numbers and have your own accounts or you pulling from loadboards?

 

No, I'm ready to buy a truck, but I'm still back and forth as to if I want to stay with big rigs or down size. I can go either way but obviously, it would be much cheaper to set up with a hot shot set up.

 

Well for the record, I'm not looking to Empire build here and get 5 trucks on the road. I'm looking to go out make very good money over the next 5 years or so then run very casually if at all after that. I'm not after building up a customer base, because I'm using trucking to jump start my early retirement and a different business.

I don't plan to be hauling loads in 10 or 20 years from now, so IMO it's probably better for me to run under someone else, which is why I was looking at places like Landstar because I can jump in and run hard then take time off when I want or need to and not be forever tied down to running the business and dealing with customers.

I'm sure long run I could make more money with my own customers/numbers ect, but I'm really just in it for a money right now not the glory.. lol

If I can go out there and make $4-5k to my truck each week leased on to another company, then I'm interested, but if it's more common to do $2 or 3k then I'm not as interested.

I'm from FL, so as obvious freight coming out sucks, it doesn't effect me a lot with big trucks though, because I usually stay out on the road 2 months at a time and just run, run, run.. That's why I do pretty good even at Prime on a lease because I stay out and run.

I know once I get my own truck I can run a lot less with semi's because I know the money I can make, but it's kinda hard to make that same judgment having not run hotshot freight.