Real estate are to high Right know. Low interest rates are skyrocking the house prices. For example Houses in south Florida they selling for 400k have never that value. Believe me I wanted to get a house but it’s just not the right time. I believe with the Biden administration interest rates will go up. I may be wrong. The reason I wanna pay chash it’s because I don’t wanna truck the entire year. 8month trucking and the rest of the year I go to Europe for my family. It’s more about the freedom Being independent. that’s why I wanna pay cash. No bank involved. i would probably start working for a company that hires Own operator, before get my own numbers. I know a lot of people fail as an O/O but in that case I see me as a buissnes guy. I don’t need money to be happy it’s all about freedom. God bless America
It buys you a pass to the owner operator club but freedom is not included. Freedom is not a business plan. You either in it 100% or don't do it. $150 000 may turn into dust after one year. A used truck for cash is $50 - 80K range and it is over 500 000 miles so but be sure to reserve 20-30k for the 1 st year maintenance then 10-15K every year. then figure in downtime and also the rates may not be at the current level, so the 8 months may not even give you enough revenue to be on equal terms with what you're making now as a company driver per year but much less. P.S. I'd go with a brand new truck, if you must and if you don't do mechanical work yourself. Besides, the used ones are way overpriced now. Put down 25% and then work the arse off and take vacations when you earn it.
We got 4 used 2015 Kenworth T680s with 500-600k miles a few years ago and we are paying more to operate them than if we had bought them brand new. Expensive lesson learned, but next time (if we survive) we are getting them new and trading them in at around 500k miles.
Hmmm... Freightliner has bad repair shops. It's a good engine, but if you have to put it in 6 weeks for repair, and get it back with the same problem, it's a hard pass. Anything with a Cummins is a good choice, if you can handle 3 pedals, even better. 2016 plus Paccar seems good, I have an mx13 and it's bulletproof. I don't hear bad things about macks.
One of my co workers (I have a normal 8-5 job now) remodels and flips houses as his side gig , and he makes more from that than his job as a hydro geologist. he makes at least $100k profit on every house. Takes about 12-15 months for each one.
A Freightliner dealership is the only experience I have because I was a company driver when I drove that piece of ####. The lights on the dashboard were always going off, regening every 6 hours, trash.