How to Buy or Rent A Moving Truck - 7 Figure Moving Academy

Depending on your bankroll when you start your moving business will determine if you’re going to buy or rent moving trucks.

If you are going to buy a moving truck you’ll want to get at least a 26-foot truck. The bigger the better.

You don’t want to be out doing a 3 bedroom move with a 16-foot truck and be forced to do multiple trips. This will lengthen the job considerably thus raising the price and anger level of your customer.

Buying a Moving Truck.

Get a 26ft truck.

If you go online and search for “used moving trucks” you’re going to get a lot of places to look.

Most of these will be U-Haul, Penske, Budget, Enterprise and so forth.

Those trucks can be good but they can also be very expensive. I’ve found that Penske’s are the best to buy if you’re going to this route.

If you have the money I would refrain from purchasing used U-Haul trucks. They tend to be less worthy and their maintenance is spotty at best.

To find good used moving trucks I would recommend that you go to these two sites:

I’ve found that these are the best places to find and buy good used for moving trucks.

These are actual moving trucks, not just good box vans that you can get from Penske or Budget.

If you do your research you’ll find that there are 3 makers of moving trucks. Each has its own pros and cons:

International
Hino
Freightliner

You can read some good discussions about which kind to buy and their pluses and minuses here.

The bottom line is, buy the truck that you can afford. If that means buying a $5000 throw away truck for a couple of years then do it.

In the long run, it’s going to make save and make you more money in the long run.

Just be sure be putting money away so that you can upgrade your fleet as soon as possible.

Renting moving trucks

Quite often is the case you’ll have to rent trucks when you’re starting off.

This will present a lot of issues by going this route so be prepared for some uphill challenges especially when it comes to getting insurance for your moving business.

You have a number of places to choose from when you rent trucks for your moving business. And I have several YouTube videos which go over all of this.

You can watch them here.

Which truck to rent:

My suggestion is that you rent U-Haul trucks if you are going only be needing a truck locally and only for a day or two.

If you get busy and you’re going to need trucks for multiple days then I would go with either Penske or Budget. With Penske being my first choice.

I like Penske because they are a better-maintained truck versus Budget or U-Haul.

Some people rent Ryder, Ideal Lease or Enterprise.

I’ve found that Ryder and Ideal Lease are better if you are going to actually lease trucks versus renting.

I’ve never rented Enterprise trucks before and I don’t know many movers that actually do either. So, I can’t really speak about them.

What I will say, though, is that they are not easy to rent as there are not many dealerships where you can pick them up.

Their stores or places to rent a few and far between.

What to rent.

You have a choice on what kind of moving truck you can rent. Either a ramp or lift-gate (yes, I know you can get a truck with both…but that’s not the point for this discussion.)

There isn’t a one size fits all scenario so to speak here.

Most movers tend to use trucks that have a ramp versus one with liftgate.

If I had a choice I would choose the ramp every time.

I’ve found that lift gates are great when you need to move heavy furniture and items in and out of the truck.

From what I’ve been told by others that live in the big congested cities is that liftgates are a must.

I have never really found that to be true as I live in the mid-west where there is space to park in a driveway. Although I have delivered once or twice to Chicago and New York and I can say that I believe them when they say that.

You may have to purchase walk boards. In this way, you can have the best of both worlds.

Unlike a truck that has both a ramp and liftgate having walk boards allow to have the liftgate up with the walk boards going off the side instead of down the middle where you may not have room.

How to rent from a dealer for the best deal.

You’re going to want to set up commercial accounts. You can do this with both Penske and Budget.

Good luck setting up one with U-Haul. It may be able to be done, but the only time that I have witnessed it was with large accounts like FedEx and UPS during the holidays.

To set up a commercial account is really easy.

The secret is networking.

What you want to do is get in good with a dealer. Not the actual outlet but with a dealer that rents these trucks on the side.

These guys earn a commission every time that they rent a truck so they’ll be a little more motivated to rent to you. Not only that, but they’ll also be willing to work with you if you’re a little short for the deposit and paying.

Is make sure you don’t do them wrong.

Remember most of these guys are small businesses like you and if you screw them over it’ll only be harder in the long run. So, treat them as if they were a member of your family. Or at least a member of your company.