New owner operator

You are right that we are in a recession and most likely will be still going down till the end of this year maybe next year. If you have a good job now it might be worth waiting it out. On the other hand if you get in now and can make it after this year you will most likely be fine.

Do you have a business plan? What truck and trailer are you planning on running? I assume you are gonna run on load board freight based on your outlook. See who you can sign up with and if they have the freight to make it the first 2-3 months. Home Much money will you have left after putting the 32K down and do you have a trailer already bought or planning on renting?

 

Start in May at least, not right now. Freight will be better and truck prices will be down more

 

Pretty skinny with 15k
You are still going to have to put out money for plates insurance 2290, a myriad of things. Do you have access to capital easily and at a fair rate? If you aren't using factoring and if your average days to collect is even only 30, how much fuel money are you burning through while waiting to be paid? Are your credit cards paid off, and have a high available balance should the need to spend money for repair, could be a tire, could be something you don't have time to fight with freightliner for 3 weeks if you are under load vs paying for oh let's say an egr cooler that is failing but not enough for them to warranty but is going to cause more issues if not resolved so do you bite the bullet and pony up I don't know, $2500? The monthly payment for insurance, truck payment if you have one, trailer rent, load board fee, etc are all coming around quick and like a wrecking ball if you aren't ready. You should look into a discount fuel card, it is your easiest way to cut down your fuel expense.

Some quick math
15,000 at 5.00 is 3000 g at 6 mpg is 18000 miles. If you run about 100,000 a year you have enough money for fuel for about 2 months. This isn't accounting at all for those fixed costs coming around monthly. Without access to more startup money you are leaving yourself quite short. I agree on avoiding factoring and quick pay, if you can. Quick pay you can use or not use at any time without contract is a much better solution than factoring. I still would strongly advise you either save some more unless you have open credit and are willing to risk it if you blow through all of it then the engine goes and now you have no asset anyone will buy and you have no earning power to pay the big debts now incurred other than driving a company truck even if you're making 2000 a week it will be difficult.

 

Everyone wants to pay cheap prices even though everything went up.
My trailer was damaged three times in two years. Not even a month passed this year when they hit the wall when unloading again.

The damage is about 8K this time. And there is shortage for parts too. People don't want to admit fault too. So, you sometimes end up paying for damages yourself if you don't want your insurance to skyrocket.
I don't advise anyone to take this journey now unless you want to spend away money every month being able to accept losses or even losing everything you put down.

 

If you don't already have customers lined up I'd say don't bother. Planning on getting good money freight constantly from loadboards isn't really a business plan, more like wishful thinking.

 

Hold off, get more money in the bank, you should have $30k left over. Get the truck checked as I have posted in the past, Dyno/Blowby, etc. ... and get a good solid business plan.