Labor rate is around 85.00 an hours. Too fix anything that your husband can't fix. Then for a good tool box to just start is expensive. Plus jacks,air compresure to handle a large impact. Then you still need a shop with large concreat pad to park truck for repairs. .... Then the list goes on.
Spending 30% of your good savings at this time isn't right. All you would be doing is basically buying himself a job. Your money is already saved. Don't buy a job in order to save what you already have. Get with a company willing to pay for his skills. Don't finance your own job.
Getting a $30- $40k truck would mean higher miles and could be buying someone else's problems. Working non stop for 8-9 months is unrealistic. I have had a new truck for over a year now and if i wanted to i couldnt work non stop. Problems and maintenance is gonna happen and sometimes it takes time. I try to plan to have my truck maintenance/issues resolved when I'm ready for time off anyways. Without knowing how reliable your truck will be it's impossible to know costs and income. Same goes for a new truck but being new and having a warranty things are more under control but you pay for that truck note and it aint cheap. I live in Tennessee, no state income Tax.. same for Texas so that's good. I'd check out Mercer and this place http://longhaultrucking.com/ Good luck
Its not a cheap business to get started. Maintenance and repair costs can border on the absurd. Fuel and insurance are not cheap either. New truck with an expensive note or used truck either financed or cash, pre-emissions or post-emissions,.. its all a gamble. Not trying to knock you or you or your husband. But at 15 months,.. he is just getting his feet wet. What happens with new drivers,.. after 3 - 6 months they start to get comfortable. What ever habits,.. bad or good,. will start to become routine. You feel like you have all the basics covered,.. your looking for a challenge. The reason going O/O looks like a viable option to him is because his comfort level as a driver has probably reached its peak. Sadly,.. and I went through this learning curve myself,.. you really dont know enough at that stage to survive. In my opinion unless you both have had prior business experience,.. its a recipe for failure. The advantage I had in starting out,.. was 10 yrs of actual experience,.. I knew my way around the industry a bit and my wife came from a family of business owners. We are both self employed today. She has the business savvy,.. I have the brawn and stubbornness to work hard and keep chiseling away. Right now is a rough time to get into trucking. Not say it can not be done. Only that with so many different regulations coming into play, that it can create problems that could be detrimental to business survival. Its nothing to spend $20,000 - $30,000+ annually for 1 truck, just on maintenance and repairs. 50% of my home time is spent going over the truck and getting it ready to go back out on the road. Its very time consuming and very demanding. My suggestion is if he wants to get into flatbed or heavy haul,.. start with flatbed doing stepdeck work,.. hire on with a respectable company that does a wide variety of different loads,.. particularly machinery and equipment. This should teach him the proper routines for permitting and securing loads for OTR and DOT compliance,.. not oil field shortcuts. Heavy haul is very expensive to get into. I am leased to a carrier that also does heavy haul and I want no part of that segment. Its nothing to spend $250k+ on a setup. The abuse the equipment takes and expenses and maintenance it costs to keep everything operational can be mind boggling. Not only that,.. but its time consuming,.. sitting and waiting on permits,.. escorts,. shippers,.. receivers etc. My carrier has shut down 2 of his RGNs and they are pulling step trailers because the rates for heavy haul right now are not worth it. Right now many O/O and carriers are operating in survival mode. I do not advise jumping into being an O/O right now. As nicely as you can,.. suggest he grind it out as a company driver for a few more years. Hurst
Also as mentioned before it's not the best time to just be starting out...rates aren't the best. I'm sure a mega would take him but the cheap rates most offer aren't conducive to succeed.
Every owner operator here will tell you it cost a million dollars to get started lollllllllllllllllllllll
On netting approximately 40-45% of your gross making that assumption is a big stretch. Most newbies and rookies in any business do good to break even that first year. You're going to make mistakes and they're going to have zeros on the end $0,000. Would you be OK losing a few thousand that first year? It took me a few years before I got into profit.
That's true but then she asked for realistic advice. Being real here freight and rates are down across all segments and heavy haul is no exception. And even in good times most people who try fail. It's not the easiest way to make a buck.
I hear you , I just got back in the game and it's going to take me 3 months just to recoup my buy in with tractor and lost income due to time lost getting signed on , insurances , etc
