How much would you recommend paying for a used truck as a new O/O?

they had a few 20-21 of them and 21 cascadias 300-320k miles sold around here at auction for 19-22k last week

 

if your going to deal with old truck problems you might as well go back a couple more years and loose the e log

 

Once you get 2 years driving, you should be able to land a good paying food grade tanker job.

High pay, low effort (kinda).

If you MUST wrench, get youself a project truck.

Just two cents from a career company driver who did the math for o/o once, and it doesn't work for me.

You do you, though, and good luck....

 

Hard to answer without knowing what your goal is..

Fixing a truck to go OTR all lower 48 ? Pre emissions won’t work in CA and probably a few more states as time goes by.

Fixing one to drive intrastate in Florida..Just find anything sitting in the dump and you’ll fit right in

 

So only buy a truck over twenty years old? That's terrible advise. Emissions systems aren't the only thing on a truck that wears out.

My advise is buy the best truck you can afford and still have twenty thousand cash in the bank.

 

Then buy a new one and throw it away in 5-7 years if you don’t have the talent to keep an old one running

purchase price and running costs are two totally different things, if you can’t afford a new one you can’t afford a used one

 

I’ve owned two trucks. The first was an 07 with egr taken off so it had no emissions stuff. My next truck was a 2017 which was fairly new at that time. Personally if I was to buy another truck, I would get one about 2-3 years old with not more than 250,000 miles at the most. Preferably I would just get a new one.

The old pre emissions truck idea is maybe not too bad. My 07 was a fairly dependable truck, but I always had about a million little things that needed fixed when I got around to it. I got fairly tired of the long to do list. I know you can go all through an old one, but that is a very big project with a lot of knowledge needed, a shop, and lots of tools that most people don’t own for big trucks.

Today I’m a company driver with no plans of ever going on my own. It’s much better in my opinion to just find a good company to work for.

 

More bad advise.

You can't equate the maintenance costs of a five year old truck with a twenty year old one. Emissions system maintenance isn't that bad if you do it yourself. It's certainly cheaper than inframes, rear ends, etc.

And are you saying the cost of maintaining a used truck is the same as buying a new truck? Maybe you should a) look at what new trucks cost these days, and b) take your own advise and learn to do your own maintenance.

Before you think up some cleaver retort, stop to remember the OP is buying his first truck. Some faded out 379 with a 4.5 mpg Cat is just going to bankrupt him.

 

Mid 5s out of my w9 that’s done it every week for the last 5 years,only truck I’ve ever owned for the last 8

35-40k into that truck every year, majority parts for myself, some sent out, and I’ll have that 29 year old truck sitting on the opposite coast in 3 days without thinking twice about it…

No payment starting out was nice, costs nothing to sit in the drive way, but now that I have 52 weeks worth of work it may be time to update

either way, if you can’t afford to run a new one you can’t afford to run a used one still stands, running cost is what matters, not purchase price, first truck or tenth doesn’t matter

 

I am not able to do it myself. I use a local mechanic who corrects the problem. Some old worn-out Ohio truck Sales special is like buying a cigar box of STD'S.