New owner oper

I would suggest a lease/purchase with a mega carrier. You’ll have to do your own research and decide which one would be the best fit, but I would advise against purchasing a truck outright. There are many reasons for this, but here are a few of the big ones:

Financing is difficult without experience and a written business plan, neither of which your friend has. That means if he does buy a truck it will most likely be an older, high mileage truck which means repairs will be common, which means money management will be key, which means that a new guy doesn’t stand a chance.

Everything changes when you leave the company driver world behind, and jumping into your own truck requires baby steps and a lot of experience/education to be successful

The rates aren’t usually as good with lease purchase as they are with being a true owner operator, but there is a bigger safety net and a lot more support available by being with a mega carrier while you learn the ropes

If being an owner operator is the end goal then I would strongly suggest taking a methodical path to get there. Sometimes in life you have to just grab the ball and run with it, but this is not one of those times. Success in this industry comes from nothing short of experience. I’d hate to see a guy go broke or burn out just because he tried to do too much too soon.

 

Good post, wasted effort. Just another person that believes that they can jump right in and do what you do. All he has to do is buy a truck and the money will pour in. After all, it's just driving, right? He wants a name, not advice. But EVERYONE is giving advice.

'You all make it seem like rocket science and it's just driving. You sit there and hold the wheel...what's so hard about that? Y'all just afraid that I will show you all up and make more money. Y'all be hatin.'

Indeed...

He wants a name. Keep all the numbers and figures, adjectives and adverbs to yourself. Is there a company that will hire this guy as an owner operator with just 7 months experience?



Yo!

 

Then he is two legs up by running flatbed. There are some good starter companies in flatbed, perhaps TMC or Roehl for example. I believe they offer the ability to lease on a truck.

What he wants to do is get into a lease that pays percentage of revenue to the truck. Landstar or Mercer are two of the biggest, but I believe they both require at least two years experience. Schneider does have a percentage option, but I don't know their longevity requirements for owner operators.

The bottom line is he needs to get paid percentage for high tarrif freight. It would be helpful to know his location in order to determine the best fit.

You would be a good friend indeed to give him the advice to cool his jets for a year or two.

 

If your friend wants to learn the business side of things he can keep track of his expenses for his company truck, get some numbers from his employer or other o/o for the stuff he doesn't have access to and that will at the very least give him a good idea of what it costs to run one of these rigs. By doing it this way he won't have to take the risk of becoming an o/o and can better prepare himself for taking himself to the next level.

This is the way I did it and after three years I finally bit the proverbial bullet and went o/o. It has worked out good for me so far but it has only been a month. I spent my first year learning how to operate the truck efficiently and safely. My second year watching the numbers and my third year finding out what type of freight hauling I want to do. After all that I ended up with a good flatbed "curtain side" company and have as good of a grasp on how to do this as I can. You really gotta have a grasp of the numbers so that you can see if it makes sense to do it. If you just jump in without knowing you can fail very easy. Good luck.

 

Typical responses from this forum. Make fun of everyone. Then when you call them out on it they cry like little baby truckers. They all have the same exact response and it is always how bad trucking is and how you will never make it. I wonder why they still do it? Anyway good luck to you, I mean to your friend and hopefully he is successful. I don't have any answers for you just don't want you to give up because of all the negativity on this forum.

 

He can check out landstar flatbed division but his experience maybe in question