Buying Or Using Companies Truck

Got a question , I'm in the position to buy a new rig as i decided to sell my house and get on the road . Question is to anyone : Would you buy a new rig to start out on the road or use a companies truck?

Got a question , I'm in the position to buy a new rig as i decided to sell my house and get on the road . Question is to anyone : Would you buy a new rig to start out on the road or use a companies truck?

Company truck! Give yourself some time to accumulate some money. As an OO you pay for everything on the truck, plus the truck payment and the fuel! In a company truck, they pay for fuel, repairs and pay you to drive it. To start out, a company driver would be wiser

Staying a company driver would always be wiser. Sure the idea of owning your own truck sounds cool but it really isn't.

Life is simple as a company driver. I don't care about my mpg, I don't care about fuel at all. If something breaks I get it fixed for free. If I want extra chains, extra windshield wipers, extra fluids I get it for free. I drive and get to my appointments on time and nothing else is on my mind. It's my birthday coming up, so I'm getting 6 days off without having to worry about making a 1000 dollar weekly payment. It's such an amazing peace of mind.

However, if I leased or owned my own truck i have to worry about fuel. If I hit a deer accidentally that's a couple grand out of my pocket. They'll charge you for every repair. If I went home, paying 1000 dollars would be on my mind at all times. I wouldn't make a paycheck, in fact, my paycheck would be -1000.

That's not talking about the cost of permits, ifta, taxes, truck and trailer payments. The list never ends.

Seriously though guys. Don't even think about leasing or owning a truck anytime soon. Get your career started and get that year of safe driving. After that your opportunities are endless. If you decide to lease or own, ill definitely keep you in my prayers - because this industry is going to tear you and your wallet apart.

Rob, I've been the owner of a small business for most of my adult life (30 years) and at one time I owned 6 big rigs. There's two things I've learned the hard way in my life.

1. Any time you can manage to get a chunk of money to put in the bank, do it and plan on leaving it there, don't start right away trying to figure out what you can spend it on.

2. Big Trucks are money pits, if you get the chance to drive one that someone else paid for and someone else will maintain, jump on it.

I never recommend that someone try owning a truck until they've gotten at least five years experience. You will go broke so quickly if you don't know how and where to get your freight, which types of freight pay the best, what are the major freight lanes, and where should you be running to so that you can be sure and get a good load back out of there. It's a cut throat business with such small margins that you will be working for peanuts if you don't know the ins and outs of it.

This O/O of over 15 years just sold the truck...and got down on my knees thanking the trucking gods for letting me out alive. The profit margin for trucking is AT MOST 3-4 %....We blew our engine...$27k just for the engine, not counting 9 weeks down time...it stripped our savings...When we were running west coast turn arounds, we made big money....but running a solo truck will keep you in that seat for every hour you can hold that steering wheel. And don't even think about going into CA...they have the strictest engine exhaust laws there is, and they are getting stiffer in January 2014. Anti idling laws about force you into cooking or freezing in your truck, or buying an APU...another thing to get worked on. If you have a family, as an O/O, you will probably lose the house, the wife, the kids,...the divorce rate in O/O's is 89%....less for company drivers...And don't even get me started about the taxes, or the fuel cost...In Fact...if you want to know about bein' an O/O just research my posts..Been there, Done that...happy as hell to get out of it...after 15 grueling years as a TEAM TRUCK...you know, the ones that run ALL the miles and the money all went into the same pot.....

APU:

Auxiliary Power Unit

On tractor trailers, and APU is a small diesel engine that powers a heat and air conditioning unit while charging the truck's main batteries at the same time. This allows the driver to remain comfortable in the cab and have access to electric power without running the main truck engine.

Having an APU helps save money in fuel costs and saves wear and tear on the main engine, though they tend to be expensive to install and maintain. Therefore only a very small percentage of the trucks on the road today come equipped with an APU.

Im a little more informed at this point of listening to you guys , here i was all gun hoe and ready to start a career in long haul owning my own truck . Feel like a punch in the gut that the industry hasnt treated you better , sorry !! i didnt realize. Sounds like just another bureaucrat thinking of ways to make someones life hard and all one wants to do is make an honest living. I will take your advice and think on this more as to how i can get into the industry. THANK-YOU

I can't believe that truckers can't make money but when i see crap going on like i did a little while ago i can see why so many truckers are upset. I was working in the back of a warehouse one day and a truck came in with a trailer and it took him an hour to back into the loading dock, it wasn't a difficult thing to do (no cramp spaces or obstacles) but when i saw for people of east origin come out of the truck and trying to guide him in my only perception was that one guy had a license and the rest were taking turns driving to make runs . This has to stop!

Rob...I know what your saying...it happens down here as well. I was pulled into the scales at Dunsmuir for an inspection. we pulled in next to a freightshaker, that had 3 of those fellows standing by their truck. when the DOT guy got on the creeper and shotunder the cab....he shot right back out...and boy was he mad !! he put the truck and trailer under HAZMAT hold...cuz those fellows had cut a hole in the floor of the sleeper.....so they only had to stop for fuel !!!!!

I can't believe that truckers can't make money

Well company drivers do fine. But you don't want to own or lease a truck. It's a commodity service where the lowest price is all that matters. Any commodity business has razor thin profits, if any at all.

Can't believe that the unions are even letting this happen out there , guess as long as the leaders in that are getting their dough their not gonna stand up to the guy that wants to make a decent living and always go with the guys that have four people on board to make the trip.Hope they go back to the day of one guy driving to one rig and pay the guy a decent wage so he might want to put in some years doing it and not going broke.