Comments By David D.

Yep, what Rainy said. There is WHOLE lot more to running any business than you see from the outside. I have high level experience is a couple of small businesses and a couple of banks and I would't dream of starting my own trucking business. Part of that has to do with my fairly short time horizon but there rest is fro having been there and done that. If I thought I could make more money buying and running my own truck I would. You can't, or at least not enough more to make it worth your while. Find a company you get along with, work your but off and enjoy your home time. The information I got was from searching the Internet for "cost of running a semi" or some such thing. This was probably the average for the entire industry and your costs as an independent will be MUCH higher. I fudged the miles for breakeven by about 10,000 miles but the idea is the same - it ain't worth your time. The $1.02 per mile includes everything but the driver cost of 36 cents per mile. How old the information is I don't know, but it's what I could find quickly. As always your mileage may vary.

If you have any farmer friends you might ask them. Heck, even if they're not friends ask anyway and offer a few bucks. What can it hurt.

The $1.02 is the average cost of operating a truck without including the driver's salary. I notice my screw up right after I posted it but dinner was hot, of I ate.

Oops my bad, I did my math wrong above, where is that calculator when you need it. You would have to drive about 75,000 miles at $2.00 per mile to cover costs. My bad, I'll go stand in the corner.

The latest number I have seen for operating a truck in the US $1.02 per mile before you include the driver's 36 cents per mile. That means that you have to run 130,000 miles per year to make it work or 2,500 miles per week or 500 miles per day for a 5 day week before you start making any money. Can and will you do that? Three weeks to California from Miami and back is only about 400 miles a day. I'm betting most folks on here do that before their afternoon break on an average day. This doesn't include all of the paperwork you need to do if you own your own truck. If you can get 2500 miles a week as a company driver you can make $46,800 a year with NO risk to your personal assets. From what you said this is less than you're making now as a nurse. If for some reason you don't get that many miles you still have to make your truck payment. My wife, who's father was a trucker for decades, won't let me buy a truck because some companies will give you just enough work to keep you from going broke when the economy tanks, but you're going to be living on beans and hot dogs. There's a reason that want to lay that risk off on you. This is all about risk management, with financial risk being one of the biggest risks if you own your own truck. Just some food for thought. I'm sure you'll do what you want. But listen to these folks, they made me change my mind about going to a school, and that ain't easy to do.

Eric, I've never run a trucking company, but I have owned a couple of businesses. Let me explain some of the realities of what you have to get involved with to own a business with employees:

1. Get a business entity - a corporation or an LLC. For liability purposes you don't want to be a sole proprietor (schedule C) as it put EVERYTHING you own at risk.

2. Get insurance for both your truck and your employee's trucks.

3. Get unemployment insurance for your drivers.

4.Open a separate bank account for the business and don't overdraw it.

5. Pay someone $100 to $300 per hour to do your tax return every year. My guess is $2,000 to $3,000 per year if you have good records (you won't).

6. Withhold and pay to the government Federal and State withholding taxes. (If you don't do this there are big penalties and the IRS will go after your personal assets even if you are a corporation or an LLC.

7. Pay someone to do your payroll every week because if you are driving you won't have time. Oh yea, employees get really testy if they don't get paid.

8. Be responsible for ALL of the repairs on your truck. If you don't have $5,000 to pay off the debt you owe right now how will you afford a new transmission or engine.

9. You have to pay for your own fuel. Even if you get 10 mpg on your truck (and I'm pretty sure you don't) a 1500 mile trip will cost you better than $375 in fuel alone at $2.50 per gallon. I don't think you can buy diesel for anywhere near that right now.

10. A hundred other things I can't think about right now.

I know it sounds nice being your own boss - it ain't so fun believe me and everyone else here.

Now for your $5,000 debt. Prime may have been patient so far but at some point this patience will wear out. At that point they will sell your debt to a company that does nothing but collect debts all day long for somewhere between 10 cents and 50 cents on the dollar. Believe me when I tell you that these folk know every trick in the book that you may know and some you don't even know exist. Even if you can't go back to Prime you need to make some kind of arrangement to get this debt paid. I imagine that right now it is showing up on your credit report as a past due/collection account. This will drop your credit score low enough that you will have a hard time getting any kind of credit, and if you can it will be VERY expensive.

I would heed everyone's advice here and get back to work driving for someone if that's how you want to make your living but however you make your living you need to get this debt paid. IT AIN'T GOING AWAY!

Well the good thing is that I have a school about a half hour or 45 minutes from my house so lodging won't be an issue. The advertised cost is $3,995 and yes I'm sure that all they will do is get me a license, that's what they get paid to do. I also have an email into them right now asking is that is the full cost of the class, funny how they like to spring surprises on you at the last minute. I fully understand that I will learn to drive, as opposed to operate a truck, on my first job. What I don't know is how trucking companies feel about the particular school I'm looking at. I will ask around and see what I can find out. I'll keep everyone updated.

Thanks Rainy and one other post that is on a different page so I can't get your name, that's exactly what I was looking for. As for school, as I said, I'm going to school, soon. I'm going to foot the bill and check around for jobs. The good thing is I live about 10 miles from I-94 and about 20-25 miles from I-69 so there should be some opportunities around. I talked to a company today that pays new drivers 36 cents a mile. I have seen bigger numbers but from what everyone is telling me here that's pretty good to start. I also liked the fact that it's a reefer and regional. The guy I talked to said I should probably be out overnight 1 or 2 nights a week. I'll check around and talk to the folks at the school to see what else may be out there. I also read Brett's book tonight so I'm tired and going to bed.

All,

Well I've come to the conclusion that G-Town was right, I need a 160 hour school. I did find a place within an hour so or so of my house that will reimburse me to the tune of $150 a month for a year to help with the school costs if I do it on my own. That gets the net cost down to about $2,200, much better than $4,000. Problem is they only pay 36 cents a mile so it may be OK, maybe not, I need to look around some more. As to the other crap there no point in continuing that discussion so I'll let it go.

Tim,

I appreciate the it's more than memorizing words, that was kind of the point of my question. I was told my someone at a trucking school that the words have become an important part of the pre-trip inspection test. I don't believe they should be, but it that's what the game is then I want to know what the rules are. (Please don't beat me up again for calling it a game it's simply a figure of speech.) I agree that it's far more important that you know what each component you are inspecting does and why it is important to the safe operation of the truck. I know most of this stuff, or if I don't I can learn it. What I didn't want to do was fail the PTI part of the test because I said something like the u-bolts had to be in good shape instead of they can't have any cracks, bends. breaks or be loose. Both pretty much get you to the same place but one might be a correct answer and one might not be. This post has gotten way off track, I'm starting to regret starting it.