It's a Team's Life

New or Used?

New or Used?

There has been the discussion of buying new equipment or keeping the older truck that has been in your business for many years. Dave and I have bought both new and used trucks.

When we first got into trucking we bought a used one-ton dually to transport campers from manufacturers to dealerships throughout the country. The truck we bought had about 30,000 miles on the odometer. Over the course of two years Dave put on over 300,000 miles. We still own this truck and it has over 400,000 miles on it now. Over those two years he replaced the transmission twice along with other minor repairs.

A year later, I began working in our business. We learned quickly that I would need my own truck. We bought another used one-ton dually with about the same 30,000 miles. We also still own this truck and it currently has nearly 300,000 miles on it.

Another year later we decided to buy a medium duty semi. This was our first brand new truck that we had built for us. Within the first 60,000 miles we had our first tow. It was all covered under warranty but still put us out of service for a few days. At just over 100,000 miles we had our second tow. This time our warranty had expired so we had to pay for the tow and repairs. Finally, after a third tow for the same repair we had enough.

We bought our first expedite truck used. It had 480,000 miles on it. The first year of ownership we had normal repairs. The next several years our maintenance bills escalated to the point where we had to give up work to get the truck fixed. After just over 1.2 million miles we traded our truck in for our current truck. Our current truck we had built to our specifications. It is our plan to keep this truck until we retire.

There is the argument that trading in equipment within five years of purchase makes sense. By the five year mark most warranties have expired and unexpected repairs may start popping up. Not only is the owner loosing money on the down time. They are also having to pay for the repair themselves. 

There is something to be said for buying new and holding on to the purchase for more than five years. In our case, building our truck over would cost so much more than it did five years ago. We know what maintenance was done on our truck because we make sure that we do all the required fluid changes as well as the suggested check-ups at the prescribed mileages. While we risk losing money during downtime we still believe that keeping this truck longer than the traditional timeframe is still in the best financial interest of our business. The money spent on truck payments can go towards maintaining the truck as well as other areas of our life such as retirement.

Here’s to millions of safe, profitable and MAINTAINED miles.

Kelly Plumb