15 clicks (10 pages and 5 posts) took me all of 90 seconds. Lewis Black is easy to find at a glance.

Enough about me. How about some wisdom for all the noobs looking for help and not getting it from your posts?

 

I understand the basis of the criticism. I have also criticized this aspect of Steve's ventures. However, after a year of sniping after what seems like every single post, I think it's been well established that his motives are not always driven by profit.

It does get old. Whaddya say, how about pointing this out after every second post LOL?

 

Steve needs to post his year-end numbers so the guys not doing this for a hobby can decide to give up their golf clubs, race cars, harleys, crotch rockets, girlie bars or whatever trips their trigger and truck for a hobby like Steve. I am not Billy Big Rigger, but I live for trucking and I make my living with trucks, its not my hobby, but it is my passion. Trucks take bucks. Steve had bucks and I think he has made some bucks, but he should share. Those naysayers should share also.

 

Lets be clear. I'm not here to defend Steve. I'm sure he can do that himself if he feels the need.

Someone who constantly needs to point out another person's bad decisions needs to play a better match of point | counterpoint.

"That's bad." >>>

"This is good." <<<

8)

 

Good timing Loadit. My year end was Oct 31.

 

If I can ever make it home, I am going to meet with an accountant and then I'll post my numbers.

I figured it out I had $22,000 of revenue in October (including the load I'm on now as I picked it up in October) but I know that number is meaningless without the mileage and fuel spent.

I have now printed out a calender and put my fuel purchases and revenue there so it will be easier to see at a glance.

By the way, what would good revenue per month for a reefer? So far I don't see the added value of buying this thing especially as this guy had me hauling produce for $1.30 a mile.

 

GMAN, your right. Just another mistake I made that I won't make again for not checking the miles. TMC does this also and when I did a little research I found that if I draw a straight line in Streets and Maps from the start to the finish, that's how they are quoting the miles. Internet Truck Stop said they may put my complaint under Bait and Switch. I guess that's why there credit rating is a C.

I didn't pick up the load yesterday. It was 6:30 my time and the company was having a problem with the poop spreader that I was to deliver. 6:00 is my bed time and due to all the stress of the day I was ready to pass out. They said no problem and are hoping to get someone to come in today to load me up. I normally get up at 1am but slept until 5 this morning!!!

I had a long talk with the USX person yesterday and she has 9 independent drivers that she deals with who take up the slack when their trucks cannot. She said there are a few of them who does this. She's pretty cool in that she won't send me to an area and just leave me without something coming out. She gave me many options yesterday including going to Miami then paying a lower rate to dead head out of Florida to pick up another load. I decided to wait for the Oregon load.

I'm at the Flying J in Ogden UT right now and it's a pretty nice place with good phone and internet connection so I'm happy. It's cold here right now, about 28 degrees. The one thing about the Rigmaster is that the instructions tell you to plug the block heater in when using the heat to create a load on the engine which will produce more heat. Sort of like your truck needing the idle to be higher or it doesn't put out any heat. I ended up buying a nice ceramic electric heater which puts the load on the engine and provides a ton more heat so that worked out great.

I mentioned in a maintenance thread that my radiator is leaking and needs to be replaced but that stopped leaking about 5 days ago so I'm not sure what's going on there. I'm assuming a little piece of something plugged the hole??

I just added up my outstanding invoices and always seem to hover around $18,000 to $22,000 in money owed. That explains why I ended up having to have a lot more cash on hand when I started out.

I'm really not sure what my cost per mile is and would probably be depressed if I figured it out. (Have fun with that one guys). I had $28,000 in my account just sitting there before I bought the Rigmaster and trailer tires and that wasn't too long ago and I'm back to almost $26,000 again. I have enough money to rebuild my engine if need be and to sit for some time if anything were to come up.

I think I work enough by being out for at least 3 weeks at a time. The last time I was out was for 6 or 7 weeks. Maybe that's the key for my success in that I keep running. I don't really spend that much on the road other than fuel, water and eating out once in a while. I do like heading home and when I get close I can't wait to get there. I only last a few days at home and then get the bug to head out again.

My truck and trailer are in absolutely perfect condition and I spare no expense in fixing even the smallest things. I seem to be always upgrading or moving things around until I get it perfect in my mind. My latest thing was the air lines on the cat walk. I bought some real nice thick rubber ones this past summer and they are the cats meow for sure. They are all tie wrapped together real nice and neat but I had a problem with the pogo stick laying over in tight turns and not standing back up again. If I adjusted the slack too much or too little the lines would touch the cat walk which is illegal although every truck I see is doing this. I ended up buying one of those double spring things and hooking it to the old Qualcomm stand on the very top of my truck. Now the air lines are like 2 feet above my cat walk, perfect slack and it works awesome. I've jack knifed my truck in both directions and it's perfect.

I feel like there is no reason for my to analyze my cost per mile or break it down even further to my hourly wage. I'm very happy with the way things are going and the fact that my bank account is growing. To me, that's a good indication. I have the cash to fix anything major that could happen at the moment. I'll keep on the way I'm going and keep saving my money. I feel pretty good that I seem to have a personal broker getting me some good loads and the rate is always higher than what I expect or that I could come up with. Rank got me a good load by the way although the bastard won't give me his PayPal email address so I can pay him his commission.

Keep in mind all you people reading my thread, I'm single, no bills other than a $1,295 mortgage per month and the utilities which come out to pretty much nothing cause I'm not at home. I have car and motorcycle insurance and a ton of other things including taxes, liability and cargo truck insurance, tolls, internet, phone, cell, cable TV, health insurance, load boards and food. I do have a spreadsheet and with every single bill I have I have $1,360.62 left over every week. This figure does not include maintenance. I don't have to put money away in a separate envelope every week as I'm not the type of person to go blow all the money in my checking account on a new toy or something.

So, if your someone like Rank or others who have huge expenses like kids in college or a tourist trucker wife like Tootie who buys every ceramic Garfield Cat or nicknack under the sun then I'm sure this left over amount would get eaten up for sure.

For me, it works, I'm happy and most of all I'm having a lot of fun and really enjoy it. Beats doing math all day, I'll tell ya that.

 

Your not permitted to enjoy what your doing and be satisfied with the money you make. It ruins the industry.

 

Sort of like marriage?