I want to do a lease with bad credit.

You drove for Interstate Distributor out of Tacoma Washington ??? When ? I was with them many years ago as a power only carrier. I really liked them. Never had a single issue with them ever. As far as lease goes if you like working as a slave and making no money then by all means have at it. One of my friends just had his truck repossessed right out of the dealership the truck was in for repairs. Yep he was lease purchasing and could not keep up with the payments so the finance company went to the dealership the truck was at ( getting repaired ) and picked up the truck. The saddest part is they are holding him responsible for the repair costs along with the back payments he owes.

In all the years I’ve been in this industry I’ve never heard any positive stories about leasing but many many negative ones. Best of luck to you sir.

 

If you don't understand this, then you don't know enough to successfully run your own truck.

Simply put - tariffs result in higher prices and fewer goods available for sale in the United States. That means fewer trucks will be needed to move the more expensive goods, which means rates will go down. I'm not sure how they could go lower than they already are, but where there's a will, there's a way.

One could argue that the resulting inflation will be transitory, they would be wrong but the argument can be made. Whether or not this is 'short term pain for long term gain', now is a horrible time to get your own truck. Low rates and high costs leave razor thin margins that don't allow a one truck operator to realize any meaningful return on his investment. Particularly when just starting out as there is a very expensive learning curve - from maintenance to accounts receivable.

Outside of current market conditions - Lease/Purchases are a scam. Schneider Finance has one of the better l/p programs out there (at least in regards to the truck terms, being a L/O for them is a different story) and the failure rate is astronomical. Schneider Finance doesn't care about the low success rate - as long as they get the truck back, they're making money. The last time I ran the numbers it worked out to an 18% APR. Over the years on TTR I've seen many guys try L/P, very few of whom ended up with the truck. Of those who did, most have returned to being company drivers or left the industry.

If you do decide to do a L/P, please plan ahead. Make sure you have health coverage included in your budget. Have 6 months of living expenses saved up so you don't NEED to run. In addition, have 3 months of fixed truck expenses so that when the unexpected happens, you're not having to put a set of tires on a credit card. Or having to buy only one new drive tire and matching it with a tire at 11/32.

 

Lease purchase program in most cases will never help your credit score most will not even report payment history to reporting agency. I don’t know of any of the lenders that finance trucks that will even count a LP program when you try to buy a truck they will still look at you as a first time buyer.For the most part imo people that get involved in LP is like you they don’t have the money and credit to buy a truck and usually there’s a reason they don’t have the money or credit like not working on skills of getting better at managing their finances.And end falling for these scams of believing there going to make so much money that they can’t fail life just isn’t that easy.You’re going to do what you want to do at the end of the day and literally just waste time you would do much better getting a company job save money in a 401k and build a savings and build your credit over time instead of trying a get rich quick scheme like LP

 

I understand the temptation, but I also know the pitfalls. As a company driver you don’t have to pay repairs or a weekly payment. If the truck goes in the shop, you either go home or get a loaner or get a free motel room. and if it’s a big, long expensive repair, you’ll probably get into another truck to keep working.
That said, many ducks have to be in a row for a Lease operator agreement to work in your favor. You made a wise choice in staying company

 

Just go to hurricane . Big shiny peterbilt, all the chicken lights you want !! Surprised @JonJon78 dropped the ball on recommending this

 

Are they the ones that say if you drive 150k miles the truck is yours? Or is that a different gimmick?

 

.not sure. Never heard of that one before.. that type of stuff I'd bet they would only dispatch you 149k miles..

 

The whole tariff thing really disappointed me. It was unnecessary and we'd be doing so much better now.