So here we go, 3rd junk run in a row.

Meanwhile, the dude that somehow gets special privilege?  Is sitting at the scale house with a Brownsville trailer.  People who spend time in the yard claim that's pretty much all he does, Brownsville. The question is, that no one has an answer to: how does he get away with that? Why does dispatch do that for him and no one else?  I could easily make 6 figures per year just doing Brownsville runs.

Whatever.  Just an annoyance that has pervaded most of the drivers for quite a while now.  I heard one of them the other day, sitting in front of the office, go off about him.  Is it his skin color? Does he make some sort of demands that the company doesn't want to deal with? He certainly doesn't do the run any better than anyone else.  He is an owner operator but we have several of those that also go down to Brownsville and they don't get that treatment.

I'll shut up about that now. Saw the manager for the first time in weeks at the office.  I wish he was doing dispatch, he wouldn't give me 3 Baker runs in a row.  He just wouldn't.  He might make me do two of them, but 3 would be out of the question.  

On the bright side, I'm employed lol.  Today's paycheck was huge.  It's a beautiful day outside, absolutely gorgeous actually. Perfect temperature and a nice slight breeze.  

Went and checked on the grass seed I planted - but it was only 4 days ago. Nothing has sprouted yet, but I remain hopeful.  Especially in the areas where there was nothing but hard, compacted dirt.  

I have no news about the property yet, but the idea of an additional 7 acres was quite appealing.  Not at the interest rate this guy is wanting tho.  I have no idea whether he's received any other offers on the property - I'm guessing that natural gas operation is a sizeable hindrance to selling it.  If this other 7 acres is on the east side, that would be great. If it's on the west side - it's still okay just not as much forest as on the east side.

There's another property available if this falls through. I'm not acting on that one yet, but it's cheap.  It also has a gas operation going on it and it takes up almost half of the property from the satellite images I was looking at.  Still enough usable property tho, but I'd have to trudge through the property and make sure it isn't a giant pool of water under those trees.  The price is what's attractive at $21,000, you are getting more than your money's worth even with the amount of property you can't use.

I've pretty much come to the conclusion that I don't want a big property right now.  I can live with a smaller one. The only way I'd do a larger property is if it's cheap and the payments aren't too high.

Remember, I'm trying not to take out loans for this project.  That means putting in maybe 20-25 pads at first, which isn't a lot but if enough spaces are filled up, covers operation expenses including the property payment, taxes and insurance.  I don't want to pay for people's electric use - not in this part of Texas where the temps get very hot in the summer and some of those rigs have 3 AC units on them.  If they are overnighters then they can pay a higher rate. If they want to live there, they can have their own power meter and pay that separate from the lot rent.  

I've been trying to come up with the rates, long termers are probably going to be around $350 per month, nightly will depend on the size of their rig and what time of year it is.  If it's summer, those big rigs are going to pay at least $40 per night.  There's no profit to be made on a unit that is going to suck so much electricity that it negates what otherwise would be profit.  Water apparently is usually given for free, so I'll try that at first.  Sewer is the biggest hangup and potentially the biggest problem with any of these pieces of land.  It's a bridge I will have to cross when I get to it.  

The huge allure of this property I want is it will be driving into a forest, literally, to get to your RV site.  If I could get 7 extra acres, I'd also put campsites on it and at least attempt to build a small cabin for rent.  I say attempt to build - I'm not paying a contractor 75k or more to build one. It's a do-it-yourself project and the county doesn't care about permits for such things, take your time and built it at your own pace.  It would take months to build one, lol.  But imagine a cabin in the woods with all the amenities of home - AC, heat, full kitchen, shower, bedroom, living room and cable.  

People don't camp the way we used to lol.  And more and more people are selling their homes and going full-time in RV's . I don't know why that's trending, but it is.  

The only drawback of this property is I really can't envision how I could set up pull throughs without taking down a large swath of trees.  Some rv'ers want pull throughs, especially the ones pulling vehicles behind them. They don't have to try to back their rig into a lot.  

As I said, I have been doing a lot of research. It certainly helps that there are online groups with people who already own RV parks and give away their expertise freely, the do's and don'ts, the pitfalls, the things people like. One of them was telling me about septic systems in Texas - highly regulated by the state, lots of cons to them but if it's all you can do, you have no choice. I'm not going to start Ben's Water Treatment plant, thanks.  Start my own sewer system, lol. That would be a hoot.  A smelly hoot! lmao

The proposal is being given to the owner today, that's all I know.  If I were the owner and was in the business, it wouldn't take me but a minute to think about it and accept or reject the offer or give a counter-offer. Which is what I would likely do - that's not enough, how about this much? And then if it's too high, I come back and say that's too much, how about this much?  

But now I know why this guy buys these properties with the gas operations. Some of them he can claim the mineral rights and get royalties off of them.  I was wondering why those properties were getting bid up so high 2 auctions ago.  Now I know.  And it's why I'm lowballing him. He only paid 10k, he's getting mineral rights and he's double and a half his money on the deal.  Just depends on how greedy the dude is.  When you're rich, you can just sit back and say, no thanks, I"ll wait for a better offer. 

When you're in my position, you are forced to say, sorry, I can't go any higher than that.  Hence the reason finding property has been a long, on-going project.  It's kind of fun, anyway, to go to all of these places and go traipsing about them, looking at all the scenery and dreaming of what I could do with it.  This one I"m looking at is by far the best property I've seen, regardless of the smaller size.  So many huge, mature trees, a road already going through it, water and electricity already at the property's edge.  

Well anyway, I'm at the plant getting loaded. 10:30 load means I'll probably be done with today between 11 pm and midnight.  Depending on how far back I want to drive before stopping.  

As for now? I'm going to put up the laptop and take a short nap before they get done with filling this trailer.

G'day