The next topic that I’d like to cover with all of the owner operators out there is budgeting. With the economy being as tight as it has been the last couple years, many people have become a lot more aware of their expenses. Trucking is one business where you can analyze and evaluate all day, and it might not do you a bit of good. At the end of the day, you need to make sure you are planning to be ready for the worst case scenario, not expecting and wishing for the best case scenario. Some things, like the rates you are paid and the miles you run are somewhat predictable. But the one variable that isnearly impossible to predict is the amount of money it is going to require to maintain your truck.
Even if you have a brand new truck or have a used truck with a million miles on it, the chance always is that you will not know when your truck might need maintenance. Some trucks may break early on, some may break later, but it eventually will break somehow. When it does break, the visit to the shop to get your truck back in business is rarely less than $1,000. Keeping this in mind, your budget needs to prepare you for these types of occurrences. Once you have this factored in, these repairs just cause a minor setback versus completely stopping your business.