Would like to lease and get through the house weekly, Abilene. TX

I had my own truck for 10 years. It started out as fun and making some money but in the end to many repairs not enough money. I'm back driving a company truck.

When you have your own truck if you making good money you can take time off. If not you have to keep running. Their is no one answer. Freight rate are high today so it easy to make money. When I had my truck rates were $1.40 per mile. If I hauled high value stuff I could get $2.20 those were hard to find. Diesel was $1.40 then went up to $4.75 a gallon. You have fuel surcharge to cover that but you need a truck that get good MPG to stay even. If you truck get good MPG you can actually make more money as fuel goes up..

Getting home just depends if you live in good freight Lane and can find lots of loads paying good money to let you go home. Did you see that one guy said he got $800 to run 200 miles. That $4 per mile. That's a lot better then what was getting. I also did long runs $2.20 for 2400 miles if I could find them.

Everyone think the trucking companies are making killing on profits on company drivers. After running my own truck and seeing the numbers. I was surprised how they paid drivers and still made money.

 

Leasing a truck isn't a bad option.

Leasing a truck from and dedicating that truck to a company that also controls when, where and how often the truck gets work - that's a bad option.

 

You can buy an older truck outright with that money. Take your time and find a good one.

I started out with $25K, and had $10K left by the time I got my first settlement check.

I paid $8000 cash for my truck. Sure it had 1.4m miles, but it was a two owner truck and was never part of a fleet. Pre-emissions and e-log exempt. I've been running it for almost a year, 9 months of that under my own authority. No major repairs, and no breakdowns. I have two seasonal dedicated power only accounts that I alternate between that pay $1k/day to the truck with a 2000 mile per week cap. One of those accounts is home daily, the other involves layovers. Both are regional.

There are better options available to you than L/P.

 

25 years and now you want to own? But not a clue how to begin. Stay company driver you will be happier in the long run.

 

What's wrong with leasing?

 

Letting someone who has no skin in the game control your money, is a guaranteed way to fail.

I know plenty of guys who have successfully completed leases. Then went on to full ownership. It’s not that difficult if you’re financially sound, willing to sacrifice, and have a sense of business.

Coming into this with a mountain of debt? That’s too much stress IMHO

 

actually with that much experience it would be dumb to lease a truck from a carrier. maybe if you didn't want to go into debt you could lease a truck from stone Mountain or like company. being tied to a carrier that owns the truck you are buying is just stupid . if you have 4 months experience maybe but you should know better . I would suggest buying a used truck and lease on to landstar or mercer some one that let's you pick your own loads . I don't think Schneider is an option in that area but I am not positive jb hunt also may have loads in your area . I am at landstar and have done loads in your area and haven't done that bad on them . there are a lot of Texas to texas loads available and good frieght going to midland as long as that lasts . biggest thing is to choose your own loads. for me it's simpler to lease on with landstar and you are not competing with company drivers like the other 3

 

save up your money, then buy

 

I knew a guy...….. he wanted to buy a truck. He talked to his boss about
the truck he was driving......he liked it but thought maybe he could make more
money if he owned the truck.

He drove for one year and kept track of every transaction. Fuel cost, maintenance
cost, how much the driver/him got paid, how much money the truck made, every
penny. Than he took his money and bought a house......kept driving the truck as
a company driver.

Years later he said that was the best decision he ever made. He has often been
glad he didn't sign the papers on that truck.

 

Sorry to be a vocabulary nerd. But you have a quandary, not a quorum. A quorum is the minimum number of people on a committee needed to make a decision. A quandary is a difficult situation or question.

A lease is NOT the way to go. Think of a company driving job, but now add on the responsibility for paying for all costs of the truck. You can keep what's left over, if anything is left over. Companies like to offer leases to drivers because it GUARANTEES the company's costs for that equipment is paid by someone else, every week or month, NO MATTER WHAT. If all of the company's customer switch to another carrier and you have no work, you are still required to keep making all payments for that truck's operation. You need a big bankroll so downtime due to extended maintenance doesn't bankrupt you. Companies ALWAYS say they will keep you busy enough to make MORE money than a company driver as a lease-operator. Companies lie.

Leasing or company driver or owner-operator isn't the answer to what is probably your real question. I think your real question is "is there local or regional work in your area (Abilene) where you can get home more often? Look at Craigslist for Abilene and drive around town looking at company names on daycabs. Daycab drivers are certainly operating somewhere near to Abilene. Research those companies you see operating daycabs. I drove daycabs in my area. Yes, you are home regularly, but you are trading 10 hours in the sleeper for 10 hours at home. You will be tempted or pressured to do all of the normal home activities in those 10 hours and sleep during the time left over. And some of those daycab jobs pay a lot less than OTR so there's that.