Instant O/O and Load boards

Ryder/Penske et al will discount drastically (read 50% off) off the website rates...which are the board rates....which are the rates you get if you find yourself stranded at the side of the highway with no account set up with them. Even at the internet "This is the rate we will rent a truck to anybody for" rate it is still dramatically less than Rob's tractor operating costs for the past 3 months when you factor in lost revenue due to down time and weeks he could have walked away from the rental for lack of work. If he had been working off a good negotiated rental account for the past 3 months he could have been as much as $10,000 ahead of where he is now.

I'm not sure if you're an actual trucker....but a typical rule of thumb for trucking is to factor .15 cpm for maintenance and repairs on highway tractor. That's typical. Rob does not seem to be typical. When you look at the fact that the real numbers for rental power come in at less than just the cpm you should bank for repairs on an owned rig which sees only average repairs it's a no brainer.

 

No it doesn't.... tact can't combat ignorance.

 

Ok, Makes a lot more sense if you can get a discounted rate. I kind of figured that might be possible if you were going to rent for an extended period of time. Internet rate seemed pretty steep to me. If you could get even 25% marked off of that rate it would start to seem worth it. And yes, i guess if you figure in all of the breakdown costs rob has had along with his actual payment load,even at the higher rental rate he probably would still come out ahead.It's just a very good thing that the problems he has encountered are not the norm for everyone or all of us would be in trouble. And as for am I a trucker.....I am off the road for a while right now but I have a tad short of 4 years in the last 5 out there doing van and flat. I already have the driving side down,just trying to learn every ounce of info i can about the business side now so I can hopefully strike it out on my own after the first of the year. Anyways,thanks for the clarification on the rental rates thing. So you do think it's possible for pretty much anyone to get that rate discounted if you have resonable negotiating skills and a need for a long term rental?

 

Here is the air diagram for the Super 10.

 

When I was renting straight trucks from Ryder...they pretty much offered to drop their pants rate wise when I said hello. I found this surprising.. and it made me ask around to see what others were getting for rates off them and found they will rent trucks for numbers that simply defy common logic. One would think you should have to pay OVER .15 cpm due to that rule of thumb I mentioned....and then there's the fact that doesn't include depreciation or plates. Well...when you're Ryder....right from the get go...you're only paying (at the most) 70% of what anyone else pays for a new truck. Parts are 50% off and lower and when you have your own mechanics you're only paying on average maybe $16 an hour for repairs. Even tag wise...they only pay a fraction of what a regular truck owner pays to tag a truck most places....and the same deal with insurance. Essentially what's going on is you're harnessing the power of a company that never buys one truck...1 tire...or even one insurance policy at a time...they buy 2000.

As to your monthly rate calculation earlier....a rule of thumb in the rental biz is 3 days typically equals a week....and 3 weeks typically equals a month....so your numbers were calculated a bit on the high side just off the board rates to begin with.

I'm thinking Ryder et al are probably hurtin just as bad as everyone else right now....rentals way down....can't move their used trucks off the sales lots....I bet one could negotiate a pretty good deal at the moment.

So...you can maybe see now why I think by using rental power as an O/O you can make one hell of a lot more money. As to your comment "you still have a trailer to pay for etc"...just the extra money rob would have made/kept over the past 3 months would have paid for 1/3 of a new hopper...So...I'm thinking an argument could be made that using rental power will allow you to pay for a high end new trailer in as little as a year. If you don't need a specialized trailer...you can rent trailers from them as well at rates that make owning your own trailer look stupid. They will rent trailers at rates that don't even seem to cover the cpm rubber cost for a regular joe blow.

 

Well, we all judge by our own standards, I guess.

 

And.......You just CAN'T fix........STUPID

 

lol nah. You're right though. Back to topic.