The journey begins - purchased a truck.

That's alright - I'm not feeling jumped. A lot of advice can damage egos and pride as it is often taken the wrong way - each has a different method and perception of information transfer and acceptance. I'm eyes and ears open!

 

That's actually 20 cents there. The lights are starting to go off in my dim skull - I'll rent a trailer for the first few months from LS.

I was initially trying to , not distance, but be independent of LS as much as practicable - hence buying my own trailer, but you're right - until I'm signed on and can access the board, and agents - I don't have a clue what will work the best for me in my location/situation.

It's not about saving/spending 5-10k here or there on a type of trailer now - it's the longer term revenue generation of tht equipment - location and situation specific.

I'd thought about signing Gretchen on - probably sooner rather than later - I don't know what their policy for "recent experience" is, but I'd bet it wouldn't be bright to let it lapse a year or two. $15k - 2200 miles . . . . salivating capitalist drooling going on. Gnom, gnomm, gnomm. 2 days work and sit at the house for the week.

Can you explain 'semi-captive' a little better? Went over my head.

 

So Far . . . .

5 by 5 dining room table is filled with piles of paper. The wife has made me promise to have it cleaared off by Christmas.

Insurance

A catch 22 exists with LS in that one cannot get the Gallagher Insurance until one has signed on. So, a quote from my local agent came up with a policy for $1730/year , but then I leaarned the difference between bobtail/non-trucking liability and Unladen liability insurance, and physical damage and comprehensive coverage.

The local agent gave me the quote for non-trucking liability, some $260/year cheaper than Gallagher, but not the full package. It will do to insure it for Jan/Feb - at $190 down and $140/month so I can drive it down the road to get it inspected at a local authorised Landstar inspection facility. Either one is less than 30 miles from the house.

No point kicking that off until jan 1st, or I'd just be paying $190 for 2 weeks of insurance. Yet to sign up to OOIDA and check their insurance rates too.

LLC

Filed for an LLC in the state of Missouri. $50 online filing fee, and printable receipts and certificates available immediately. Set the date for 1/1/2015 to simplify things. I ran all this past the local attorney, and need to create an 'operating agreement' for personal files, to over-ride the preassigned state rules in absence of such.

TAXES

Spent 2 hours with a local tax guy going over the plan and current situation. We'll complete this years taxes as we have done in the past using Turbo Tax, and then I'll present the last 3 years returns to him and supply him with profit and loss statements, and touch base during the year to keep him in the loop. He's a bit fuzzy on the 'LLC taxed as an S corp' and drawing a salary, then cash draws that avoid the 15% SET, but I'll work on him. He says we don't need to make a firm election until the end of 2015 as to how the business is taxed, so there's time. We also went over the deductions available - from a percentage of the shop utilities and depreciation on the shop itself, to home office expenses along with the usual truck deductions.

EQUIPMENT

A user on here has a 3 door Merritt headache rack, chains, binders, straps, winches and tarps for around $2,000. He's about 750 miles away, but if the equipment is all in good shape, there's an immediate savings of at least $1,500. LS has a pre-packaged deal for start-ups that runs $3,300 - and is taken out of your settlements for a few weeks. I'd rather hurt on the cash now, and be ready to go without the payments.

TRAILER

I think I'll rent the trailer from Landstar for the first few months. It's $170/week with no change to the percentage of revenue, and as advised here by Fortycal and others, it'll allow a learning curve period to take place until I am certain of what versatility I need. I was initially looking for a 48 foot flat - this may turn into a 53' flat or step. As said, I won't know what freight is available in my area until I've had a good long look at the board.

PLATES

I'll also take the cash crunch and buy Missouri plates. I bought the truck on the 8th of December, so it'll give me 30 days - the 8th of January - to pay property tax on the tractor, and buy the half portion of the 2290, in order to title and tag the tractor. Waiting till the 1st of the year co-incides with everything else, tax/LLC/insurance etc. Missouri tags are slightly cheaper than Illinois, and my local DMV is a small town affair - very helpful and friendly.

LANDSTAR

The Qualification center is pretty busy, and I'm sure they deal with dummies like me all day, so they're kinda short and snappy with their answers. I have a stack of papers to return to them, some requires more boxes to check on my end. The recruiter hasn't been all that helpful - I shouldn't expect that everybody in a trrucking organisation has driven a truck before, but it would help. I 'think so' and I 'KNOW so' - could be an expensive difference for me. I'm new, I'm learning, I'll get there.

OFFICE

I set up the home office with a nice biscuited maple top on a 3/4' pipe frame, so it's workable. Bought a 22 pocket folder for the reciept filing, and will set up with KR's Profit guages for the meantime. When I figure out how to run a spreadsheet, we can do that part ourselves for the $25/month savings.

RUNNING COSTS

These have been thrashed six ways, sideways and Sundays. I won't go into them, but I factored fixed costs on 100k miles a year, then 125k miles a year, paying ourselves back for the tractor over 1 year. I've left the personal side out of it - there's a 401k loan that will have to be figured out when we quit our employer. At that stage it'll only be 20k, but I've yet to enquire about the rollover process.

TO DO LIST- endless.

Join OOIDA. Obtain EIN for LLC. Go through 2 years of previous owners maintenance records and categorize and sort . Contact CFI about prior records (Thanks Double Yellow - good idea) . Road trip to purchase headache rack and equipment. Insure and inspect tractor. Complete and return remaining LS paperwork. Title and tag truck. Ready equipment - triangles,flares,sparefuses,extinguisher,permits . . . big radio (hee hee), turn truck up to 90mph (kidding), buy belt buckle that says "I'm a big Super trucker now" - purchase fingerless driving gloves . . . . .

And keep working. Paying up on the front end will help me in the start - but its ouch, ouch ouch this close to Christmas and light freight.

It's kept me pretty busy the last few weeks. I now realise what a burden it must be on guys that switch carriers - there's a lot of cost and hoops to jump through, I doubt it's a seamless experience. We have the luxury of retaining the current employer and income while getting ready to go - and patience is a virtue in this situation.

Oh - forgot.

HEALTH INSURANCE

Looks like the two of us will go from $60/month (employee sponsored-United) to $650/month (Coventry) $7500 joint deductible-$13,200 joint out of pocket coverage. Yeah. Ouch.

Well - the Four Roses is looking sad, so it's off to the refill store to refill that - and step away from the truck stuff . . . . Step . . . away . . . . from the . . . TRUCK . . . . . STUFF!!

 

Oooh - One more touching story.

The guy I bought it from - Vaughans in Monett, runs dump trucks. Stand up guy.

He said "Everything works on it". I took it for a test drive. Couldn't get the headlight switch to behave correctly. He ordered another, and didn't charge for it. I rang him a day or so later for something else and I mentioned the mirror switch didn't work properly. He ordered another from KW, I offered to pay for it.

He said "I told you everything worked, you found something that didn't, I'll replace it" .

Real nice to run into a man who stands by his word.

 

OK - Glad you stepped in here.

You'll have to explain this to me llike I'm a 6 year old.

Do you mean the unladen liability policy that LS requires is only written by Gallagher? I checked their price and it's competitive - and looks like their physical on $15k is also.

OCC/ACC - Is that their CPP? - Contractor Protection Plan? MO doesn't require Work comp for solo driver in an LLC, and as I understand it, LS requires I participate in the CPP - no opt out.

PLATES - Missouri charges sales tax on the stted purchase price on the back of the title, (7% of the $7,500 he wrote down), in order to title it in the state of MO. The truck will then be a piece of property of which I'll pay yearly property tax on, along with all other vehicles and houses. Then, the MO plate is about $1500 - the DMV gave me a 'sales tax exempt' form to fill out with LS's MC and DOT #'s.

I'm a little fuzzy here . . .

LANDSTAR - It's Starqual out of Chicago, I think. I realise they're busy, but I don't want to be making $1500 mistakes here . . . .