
You don’t have any benefits - no health insurance, no investments, and no retirement. In hot shot trucking, you’re basically self-employed.

In that case, hot shot trucking may or may not be worth it. If you’re taking home say $850 a week, that means you’re probably making $1,250 before tax. So regardless of what you do, get familiar with the load board because you’ll be using it a lot - whether you’re starting out or whether you’ve been doing this for a while. So you’ll still have to get a return load, and that means you’ll still probably use a load board. I can take any outbound freight you have.” But essentially, you become friends and the guy calls you first.Īnd if you live in a good area, sometimes you can go to a shipper and say, “Hey you guys send stuff out on hotshots all the time. That’s why it’s important to develop relationships and friendships. If you’re not available, he or she will post it on the load board.

Eventually, only a percentage (say 50%) of your loads will come from load boards. Develop Relationships With Shippers and Brokers Loads go quickly, so speed will set you apart - how quickly you call. Some smaller brokers prefer one over the other, but most of the time, loads do get posted to both right away. Loads on these boards are posted almost immediately because big brokers use an API to post to both load boards. You don’t have to have both you can just choose one or the other. These are the two most common load boards. One of them is DAT, the biggest of them all. If you do decide to go down this route, you will want to use one of two load boards. Because of this, we generally do not recommend it for someone who already drives a semi to step back or down to a hotshot. There aren’t as many opportunities to get loads. Why? Well, in general, it’s going a step back from being a semi truck driver. If you’re a CDL Class A holder with experience, you may want to reconsider going into hotshot trucking.

If you end up choosing this route, we’ll give you some tips on how to find loads and book freight. Are you a CDL Class A wanting to get into hot shot trucking?Īre you looking to hotshot under your own authority? This article will help you evaluate if this decision is the right one for you.
