Jeff HeartOwner-Operator
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Jeff Heart · The numbers behind the windshield

Most drivers who go under did not fail suddenly.

They ran eighteen months of slightly unprofitable miles without knowing the miles were unprofitable — then a transmission went out and the whole thing came down at once. The transmission gets blamed. The eighteen months did it.

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38
Chapters
144
Pages
5
Worksheets
Jeff Heart at his dispatch desk

“A rate is not high or low in the abstract. It is high or low against your number.”

Chapter 01 — What A Mile Actually Costs You
The Owner-Operator Survival Manual
Section I — The Manual

This is a business manual, not a motivational book.

There is nothing in here about loving the open road. You already know whether you love it. What you may not know is exactly what your truck costs you every time the wheels turn — and that single missing number is what ends most one-truck operations.

You are going to hear two stories about this market and both of them are partly true. The headline story is that freight came back. That is real. Spot rates through the first half of 2026 have run thirty to forty-five percent above where they sat in 2025, and for the first time since early 2022 spot crossed above contract.

The story underneath is that your costs came back too, and they came back faster. The American Transportation Research Institute put the industry-average cost of operating a truck at $2.336 per mile for 2025 — the highest figure in the history of that report. Strip fuel out and costs still rose 4.2 percent, well ahead of inflation.

“Calculating it is boring, it takes about two hours, and the answer is usually worse than you hoped. So people run on a feel for it instead. Feel is what gets you eighteen months into unprofitable freight without noticing.” Chapter 01

Some of what is in this book comes from videos I have posted. Most of it goes further than the videos ever could, because a video has to hold your attention and a book only has to be right. A few chapters are things I have never put on camera at all, because they take twenty pages to explain properly and nobody watches a twenty-page video.

Section II — The Difference

The same truck, run two ways.

Every figure in the right-hand column comes from the book's worked example: a used sleeper, dry van, its own authority, one driver, 110,000 miles a year.

The way most one-truck operations run
Cost per mileA feel for it. Somewhere around a buck and a half, probably. Never actually calculated.
The floorWhatever the market is paying this week, according to the man on the phone.
DeadheadNot counted. The empty miles to the pickup are just part of the job.
The negotiation call“What's it paying?” — the first question out of your mouth, which hands them the anchor.
A cheap load on a Friday“Something is better than nothing.” Taken most weeks it is offered.
A new brokerThe rate confirmation looks professional, so you book it.
The truckA $9,000 week you did not see coming, in a month you could not afford it.
The way this manual runs one
Cost per mile$1.83 per paid mile. Calculated once in about two hours, updated quarterly on a worksheet.
The floor$2.63 per paid mile — operating cost, plus your own pay, plus the reserve for the next truck. Written down before you dial.
DeadheadCounted. A deadhead mile burns real fuel and wears real tires, and the load that caused it has to carry it.
The negotiation callAvailability, window, commodity, miles and shipper location — rate is the fourth question, asked word for word.
A cheap load on a FridayBelow the floor four times a quarter, and only when the alternative is genuinely nothing — not “nothing good.”
A new brokerSeven checks, five minutes, once per broker: authority, bond, days-to-pay, company age, phone, domain, and the search that finds the trail.
The truckA maintenance schedule that prices that week before it happens, and a shop estimate you know how to say no to.
Section III — What's Inside

Thirty-eight chapters, in ten parts.

Read it in any order — go straight to whichever part of the operation is bleeding. But if you read only one part, read Part One. Everything after it assumes you know your cost per mile.

Part One

The Numbers

  1. 01What A Mile Actually Costs You
  2. 02Fixed Costs: The Money That Burns While You Sleep
  3. 03Your Break-Even Rate And The Line You Never Cross
  4. 04The Miles That Pay Nothing
  5. 05Books You Can Keep In Twenty Minutes A Week
Part Two

The Market

  1. 06What Happened To Freight, And Why Your Margin Did Not Recover
  2. 07Reading The Market Yourself
  3. 08Lane Selection: Where The Money Hides
  4. 09When To Sit, When To Roll, When To Park
Part Three

Brokers And Rates

  1. 10How A Broker Sets Your Rate
  2. 11The Negotiation Call, Word For Word
  3. 12The Rate Confirmation And The Money You Are Owed
  4. 13Double Brokers, Fraud, And Getting Paid
Part Four

Better Freight

  1. 14Getting Off The Load Board
  2. 15The Shipper Packet And The Cold Call
  3. 16Contract Freight, Dedicated Lanes, And Mini-Bids
  4. 17The Niches That Pay More
  5. 18Freight The Robots Cannot Take
Part Five

Fuel And Rolling Costs

  1. 19Where The Fuel Money Really Goes
  2. 20Fuel Cards, Discounts, And The IFTA Nobody Explains
  3. 21Driving For MPG
  4. 22Tires, Idle, And The Cost Of A Night
Part Six

The Truck

  1. 23The Maintenance Schedule That Prevents The $9,000 Week
  2. 24Emissions Systems: DPF, DEF, EGR, And The Regen
  3. 25Shop Bills: Reading An Estimate And Saying No
  4. 26Buying The Right Truck For This Market
  5. 27EPA 2027 And The Pre-Buy Decision
Part Seven

Staying Legal

  1. 28The DOT Audit: What They Ask For
  2. 29CSA Scores And The New Math
  3. 30Hours Of Service Without Losing Money
  4. 31The Clearinghouse, The Physical, And The Paper That Parks You
  5. 32Insurance: What You Need And How To Lower It
Part Eight

The Business

  1. 33Leased-On Or Your Own Authority
  2. 34Factoring, Quick Pay, And Cash Flow
  3. 35Taxes For The One-Truck Business
  4. 36Paying Yourself, The Reserve, And The Second Truck
Part Nine

The Driver

  1. 37The Body, The Sleep, And The People Waiting
  2. 38The Exit: Selling The Truck And Getting Out Whole
Part Ten

The Worksheets

  1. ›The Cost Per Mile Worksheet
  2. ›The Load Decision Card
  3. ›The Broker Vetting Sheet
  4. ›The Monthly Numbers Sheet
  5. ›The Maintenance And Compliance Log
  6. ›Glossary — every term in plain language
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Section IV — Reader Results

What drivers say after they run the numbers.

“

I did the cost-per-mile worksheet on a Sunday and sat there looking at it. I had been running two lanes all year that were under my floor. I thought they were my good lanes because the checks were big. The checks were big because the miles were long.

Dale R.Dry van · one truck · Ohio

“

Chapter 11 is the one. I stopped asking what it pays first. Four calls later a broker came up thirty cents on a Laredo run without me ever naming a number. That paid for the book about forty times over.

Marcus T.Reefer · own authority · Texas

“

The broker vetting sheet caught one for me in the second week. Brand new outfit, phone number did not match the FMCSA record. I passed on the load. Heard later that three carriers did not get paid on it.

Ronnie K.Flatbed · leased on · Georgia

Jeff Heart
Section V — About

I write down the part nobody films.

I have spent my working life around one-truck operations — mine and other people's. The videos I post are the short version: the thing you can explain in eight minutes at a fuel island. This book is the long version.

Every chapter here follows the same shape, because a repeated shape is easier to use at a truck stop at midnight than a clever one. What the problem is and roughly what it costs. The working section, walked through the way one driver explains something to another across a table. What the method does not do — because everything in trucking has a limit, and the people selling you things will not tell you where theirs is. Then the arithmetic: what it costs to start, what it puts back in your pocket, and how long it takes.

Where a number matters I give you the number and where it came from, with the year attached, so you can tell how stale it has gotten by the time you read this. And I will tell you plainly what this book is not. It is not a promise that you will make money. What a book can do is show you the numbers early enough to act on them.

Jeff HeartAuthor · The Owner-Operator Survival Manual
Section VI — Order

Know your number before the next call.

The Owner-Operator Survival Manual

First Edition · 2026
  • ✓The complete manual — 144 pages, 38 chapters in ten parts, PDF
  • ✓Part One: cost per mile and the break-even floor, worked end to end on one example truck
  • ✓The negotiation call, word for word — the sentences, in order
  • ✓The seven-point broker vetting check, and the double-brokering tells
  • ✓Five worksheets — cost per mile, load decision card, broker vetting, monthly numbers, maintenance and compliance log
  • ✓A plain-language glossary of every term used in the book
  • ✓Every figure carries the year it came from, so you can tell how stale it has gotten
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Section VII — Questions

Questions drivers ask.

Is this just your videos printed out?

No. Some of what is in the book comes from videos I have posted, and I say so where it does. Most of it goes further than the videos ever could, because a video has to hold your attention and a book only has to be right. Several chapters — the DOT audit walkthrough, the tax chapter, the exit chapter — have never been on camera at all, because they take twenty pages to explain properly and nobody watches a twenty-page video.

Your videos are free. Why would I buy this?

Because the free version has to be short. A video can tell you that your cost per mile matters. It cannot sit with you for two hours while you build the number out of twelve months of your own settlement statements, and it cannot be open on the passenger seat while you do it. That is what the worksheets in the back are for.

The other reason is order. The book is built so that Part One holds up everything after it. On a channel you get chapters in whatever order I happened to film them.

Why only $27 for a 144-page manual?

Because of who I want reading it. The drivers who need Part One most are the ones running eighteen months of unprofitable miles right now, and they are not in a position to spend two hundred dollars on a maybe. Twenty-seven dollars is under six gallons of diesel. If the book is worth anything at all, it clears that on the first load you price properly — and if it is not, I would rather you found that out cheap.

My truck isn't your example truck. Do the numbers still apply?

The numbers are worked on one truck on purpose — a used sleeper, dry van, own authority, about 110,000 miles a year of which 100,000 are paid. I had to pick something, and a worked example you can follow all the way through is worth more than a page of ranges.

Your truck is not that truck. Substitute your own figures everywhere; the worksheets at the back are built for exactly that. The method is what transfers, not my fuel bill.

I'm leased on, not under my own authority. Is this for me?

Yes, with one exception. Parts One, Five, Six, Seven and Nine apply to you unchanged — your cost per mile, your fuel, your truck, your compliance and your body do not care who your authority belongs to. The broker chapters are less use while you are leased on. Chapter 33 is the one that compares the two arrangements honestly, including the case for staying leased.

What format is it, and how do I get it?

A PDF, delivered the moment you buy through Gumroad. It reads on a phone in a sleeper, on a tablet, or on a laptop, and it prints if you would rather have the worksheets on paper — most people print the five worksheets and leave the rest on the phone. Instant download, and it is yours to keep.

Is any of this legal or tax advice?

No. It is general business, operational and regulatory information for commercial motor carriers, written by a driver, not a lawyer or a CPA. Where a subject touches the law — your authority, your taxes, your insurance, an audit — I tell you what generally applies and where the lines are, and then I tell you to verify it with FMCSA, your state agency, or a professional who is accountable for the answer. Regulations change and vary by jurisdiction.