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General => General discussion => Topic started by: Roverdose on 28 April 2012, 00:21
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I'm a courier looking at coming off hourly rate at work and going self employed at a "per parcel rate" . Anyone else done anything similar? Cost and expense wise:
First parcel rate £1.35
Subsequent parcel rate £0.68
Collection rate £3.80
Costs
Van lease £130 Per week
Wear and tear £0.08 pence per mile (aprox 100miles per day 6 days per week)
Insurance £4 per day
Fuel £120 - £140 per week
A friend of mine who's doing this on another route with the same cost did over £200 in profit today. Worth doin. Anyone got a van? What mileage are you getting? I think the key with this is to own my own van, needs to be LWB high top really, any thoughts?
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I would say unless you own the van outright then don't do it, mate of mine runs 5 44ton lorries, he did look into doing courier work with vans but the margins were too small, to lease and run a van and pay a driver a decent wage (what you would want doing it self employed) meant that he would have broken even, which sounds ok if your doing it for yourself and not as a business employing someone, but then you have to take into account things like the van breaking down, you may have it on an r&m lease so wouldn't cost you anything for repair, but you aren't working while it is being repaired so you lose money, you don't get paid for drops where no one was in and have to deliver it again at your own cost.
I had a mate who ran his own van doing this, he owned it outright and still only did it for a few months because he was working all the hours god sent and making peanuts.
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I see what your saying but i'm doing 70 drops a day and 7-10 collections a day so lets call that £112 a day, from my calculations i won't be any worse off if i'm leaseing the van from dash, it's a brand new transit, so it drinks fuel like a twit but has warentee and someone else pays the bills etc, however if i can find a trader who will sell me a van on a hp type arrangement at £133pw then im making the same money im on now AND buying my own van which would be a Renault master or a Peugeot boxer as they both do massively better mpg's over the transit so id save around £40 per week which takes my take home to £350, if i buy a van for say £2200 (like the fiat ducato i've seen) it will take 16 weeks to pay it off at £133 p/w but after that my take home will be £480ish per week, massive improvement on what i'm on now! Not going to employ someone except for when i have time off, in which case i have a mate that will do it £5 per hour. Bargain!
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But if your looking at buying a van for £2200 it's going to be fairly old and have quite a few miles on it, which means it will probably need more repairs than a newer van, which because you own it you will have to pay for and that will have to come out your £480 take home, so while it's off the road for repair you'll be losing money, then you'll have the repair bill, might only be £50 for changing a wheel bearing, but could just as easily be a gearbox or engine costing £500+ to repair and however many days off waiting for the garage to fit it in.
Ideally you'd want a lwb high roof sprinter, much more reliable, more comfortable, not too bad on fuel and they ride a lot better than a boxer, new transits are sh!t, they go through starter motors, clutch's, flywheels and fuel pumps like they are going out of fashion.
You need to think, is the possibility of earning £480 per week worth the risk of having the time off and cost of repairs and work going slack, £350 per week guaranteed is better than £480 profit 1 week then £100 profit the next, not knowing what is coming in from 1 week to the next, then the possibility of big bills.
If you do decide to go for it good luck and I hope it works out for you.
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The big question is will you get the amount of work as a self employed person or a member of staff cos not all companys will give self employed people as much as hourly rated.
You would be best owning a van out right also you will haft to pay your own ni and bits like that.
As self employed myself sometimes its awsome and others not works out about even most the time but that me
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I'll have my usual postcodes and i will also be allowed to cherry pick from the neighbouring postcode if im short on stops, I've spoken to a mate i work with and he's going to sell me his Vivaro at 130 quid a week, so after 16.5 weeks the van will be mine, it's ideal really as i can find cheaper insurance than the standard that comes with the transit at £4 per day and i won't have to pay the 8p per mile, i might pay it to myself and save it as a vehicle wear and tear fund, my plan is to save at least 50% of what i earn anyway after i'm out of debt. I'm excited but ever so slightly sh1ting my pants at the same time! Every now and then all i think is what if it goes wrong! Just want to make sure iv'e thought of everything humanly possible, I've been experimenting with my route while im still on hourly to try and get the best result for the mileage, I've previously left Tesco's for someone else to do as it's a 12 o'clock delivery and slap bang in the middle of my route, but theres sometimes 30 parcels for them so it would be foolish not to try and make it work, iv'e also got the problem that because i don't get on the road till half 11ish, by the time i get to Helston town center alot of the businesses are closed so i'm driving past stops loosing money, need to make a economical route where the buisinesses are priority, that way by the time i get to the home delivery it'll be after 5 and more people will be home, so more sucesfull stops! Really need to get more collections aswell, i keep getting these paperless collections where you just hand over a "bullet" from the label, at least half of these i get to and somebody's already been, wondering if i can still invoice yodel for the collection even though it's a failure. Feel free to rip this thread apart as i really do wanna make sure iv'e thought about it from every possible angle.
Many thanks, Ian
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I'll have my usual postcodes and i will also be allowed to cherry pick from the neighbouring postcode if im short on stops, I've spoken to a mate i work with and he's going to sell me his Vivaro at 130 quid a week, so after 16.5 weeks the van will be mine, it's ideal really as i can find cheaper insurance than the standard that comes with the transit at £4 per day and i won't have to pay the 8p per mile, i might pay it to myself and save it as a vehicle wear and tear fund, my plan is to save at least 50% of what i earn anyway after i'm out of debt. I'm excited but ever so slightly sh1ting my pants at the same time! Every now and then all i think is what if it goes wrong! Just want to make sure iv'e thought of everything humanly possible, I've been experimenting with my route while im still on hourly to try and get the best result for the mileage, I've previously left Tesco's for someone else to do as it's a 12 o'clock delivery and slap bang in the middle of my route, but theres sometimes 30 parcels for them so it would be foolish not to try and make it work, iv'e also got the problem that because i don't get on the road till half 11ish, by the time i get to Helston town center alot of the businesses are closed so i'm driving past stops loosing money, need to make a economical route where the buisinesses are priority, that way by the time i get to the home delivery it'll be after 5 and more people will be home, so more sucesfull stops! Really need to get more collections aswell, i keep getting these paperless collections where you just hand over a "bullet" from the label, at least half of these i get to and somebody's already been, wondering if i can still invoice yodel for the collection even though it's a failure. Feel free to rip this thread apart as i really do wanna make sure iv'e thought about it from every possible angle.
Many thanks, Ian
i have 2 pieces of advise for you.
1. ffs don't get a vivaro
2. if you do decide to do this i suggest that all the extra money you make goes into taking some courses and learning a decent trade. there are loads of evening courses available.
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Whats wrong with a Vivaro? 1.9 non turbo Renault engine, fair enough the gearboxes are made of cheese but every van has it's weekness, sprinters go through clutches and turbos, transits get to 4 years old and just give up, and Peugeot's rot and rot and rot and tend to not start every now and then for no reason whatsoever. I've got a trade as a fibreglass boat builder but the money is crap and seasonal, i need my 30k so i can buy my boat and become semi retired, i have no wish to be rich or own a house, never have, never will, all i care about is getting my boat and becoming a hermit by the time i'm 35, i'm 26 at the moment so i'm in with a shout of achieving my goal. I hate the game of tax, pensions and finance, but in order to get out of the game i'm going to have to play it for a while!
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Vivaro's are renault traffic vans with worse engines, they are sh!t.
I bought this van with only 60,000 on the clock and very tidy looking. In three years it’s done an extra 22,000; it’s been off the road for over a year costing me a fortune in lost earnings. It’s had a new turbo costing £550, a new battery at £150, a new master clyinder at £150, a new slave cylinder at £675, a complete head rebuild costing £1300 (top) an engine rebuild (bottom half) costing £1400, a new clutch at £680 and now the gear box needs repairing at around £600 - £800! It has nearly put me out of business and so it’s now being sold for spares and repairs. Beware!!
I have a 2002 long wheel base Vivaro. Where do I start? I have had the van for two years now and it’s going on the 7th of Jan 2012 and good riddance! It has always been serviced, oil levels checked etc., etc. In the two years I have owned it I have spent £1000’s repairing it. To start with the gearbox failed, traditionally third gear first and then totally failed. It was recovered to Vauxhall for repair, then three weeks later the brand new box failed. It was again recovered back to Vauxhall who tried to blame poor driving for the failure (but that’s another story). After the gearbox problems had been sorted, the clutch failed. The van had only done 60,000 miles at this point. After this everything ran smoothly for a while, until one afternoon, the turbo started to over run. In stand still traffic, the van started to pump over 6000 revs and the key wouldnt shut it off. The only way was to stall it, but by this time the turbo was cooked. I thought that this was the end of my Vivaro, however I had it repaired by a small company and not Vauxhall with their astronomical bills. 6 months plain sailing, shortly followed by the power steering pump failing. Re-booked back into Vauxhall, 3 days later and £400 lighter my van was returned to me. Not even a week later, I pull off the motorway slip road to be surrounded by white smoke and a very rich burning smell. All the oil from the power steering had leaked through the alternator, leaving it to slowly cook itself. I was told by an independent garage that this could and should have been cleaned to prevent it after the leak. Now the speedometer has packed up. ECU light comes on as you go over 50mph. This was the straw that broke the camels back. I will never own another Vivaro, or Vauxhall/Renault for that matter. Not only do the vans appear to be poorly constructed, not much can be said for the Vauxhall/Renault service centres. Back to Ford for me!!!
I bought a low mileage van with full service history. The EGR valve went, then the power steering pump went and next the injecters played up (but they get seized so new head). A great drive and comfy, but such a shame as they suffer so many silly problems. I have just changed it for a Toyota Hiace, which is a bit basic but a lot better. Would I have a Vivaro again? No!
So basically what's wrong with a Vivaro is EVERYTHING! DON'T DO IT! my old boss had a Traffic van, that was sh!t too, cost him a fortune.
Don't forget if work goes slack where you are, the self employed people will be the first to lose work, if they have people on an hourly rate they WILL get preference, no matter what they might tell you.
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Why are you working out your costs daily? Would it not be better to work out on a monthly basis?
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im self employed in the building and construction industry if you dont get no work you dont get paid its not all its cracked out to be mate and personally i would stay on an hourly rate if you can :smiley:
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The problem is you have a lot of risk but not much to gain, if you were going to be looking at making a profit of £700/£800 per week and are on £350 at the moment then I'd say go for it, but you'll only be looking at an extra £100ish per week, with the worry of no work, if your off sick you don't earn, you take holiday you either don't earn or have to pay someone else so lose money, and if the van needs repairs you'll have big bills, you may earn £5200 extra per year, but can spend that repairing your van and then having it blow up so would need to buy another.
Also the main reason new businesses fail is lack of money, I'm not being funny but it sounds like you don't have much to play with if you need to buy a £2200 van on hp, Ideally you should have enough money to live on for at least a couple of months and to pay for repairs/ worst case buy another van, as if you have just started and your van goes pop your screwed, if you can't afford to fix it your out of work and you can't buy another as you already have this one on hp.
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on what planet do you think you can semi retire with a boat and no savings?
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With no debt and owning my boat outright very easilly thankyou very much, you can't rip me to shreads on that one as iv'e done it before. Right, where do i start. My service center employs 4 drivers on a full time basis, my route will have a legally binding contract which both partys must fulfill, they can't give my route away and i can't just take a day off, when i have holiday or am sick i must get somebody to do my route for me, i have a mate who moonlights for £5 per hour and will cover, iv'e aggreed a bonus of £30 per day if he reaches target (70 stops before 7pm). My service center used to be a DHL site bringing in 30-40 parcels on my route when quiet and 120 - 140 during peak (sept - feb) up the road was the former HDNL site, now closed, the two businesses were merged together and now we get all there work aswell. They were always bussier than we were so now i'm getting between 70-80 per day when it's dead and i don't even want to think about peak, because my agent is DASH who own the contract with yodel for west cornwall, i can have help from them as and when i need it. In the event of dash loosing the contract i'm safe as my contract must be passed on to the incoming service partner, yodel will always and do favour service partners over full time employed staff as sh1t drivers are easier to get rid of that way. My contract with Yodel IS SAFE.
Fair point with the vivaro, iv'e heard good things economy and reliability wise about the fiat ducato. Probably worth a look, could do with something bigger tbh but sprinters and transits are a no no, i can fix my own van and have access to cheap parts and tyres, really i need a renault master simply for the fact that if it goes wrong i have well conected people.
I find it easier to deal with the numbers on a daily basis, it's all in the detail with a small turnover so i think small for now and take each day as it comes. Either way i've got nothing to loose and i'm heading for trully sh!t times if i carry on like this so f**k it, give it my all and try and make a sucsess of it! Keep it coming! At first i'm thinking c**ts but your all helping me to see it from a different angle,
Many thanks, ian
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Fiat ducato vans are also sh!t, lots of electrical faults with them, vw transporters are good as long as you don't get one with ceramic cylinder liners.
As I said, they can say what they like, your contract means nothing unless your the one breaking it, my mate is contracted to a haulage firm (turners of soham ltd) they have 1400 of their own lorries but still need owner drivers, in his contract he is guaranteed £1600 worth of work per week, (even if he only does £200 worth of work they have to make it up to £1600) which is why in february and most of march he didn't get more than £1400 per week, after diesel he needs to make £450 per week just to keep running, he was using £900-£1100 per week so was losing money, if he argued saying I'm guaranteed this amount they would simply have got rid of him.
But when he broke down and was off the road for a day so lost a days wage, that day was £600 and also had a £1800 repair bill for a wheel bearing and a second hand hub, they were not happy and gave him 3 weeks of sh!t work that uses a lot of diesel but doesn't pay that well, (what they do when someone messes them about.)
In february my mate spent £11,000 on servicing and repairs, he earned after diesel less than £2000, luckily he had the money in the bank, but is now almost wiped out, if he has another medium size breakdown, it'll almost certainly put him out of business, a large breakdown will put him out of business, so he is now very stressed out and hoping nothing goes wrong in the next couple of months.
I'm not trying to argue everything you say, just make sure that you are fully aware of all the things that can go wrong and how hard it can be to keep a business running, and how stressful it can be, if you do go for it I wish you all the luck in the world.
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I considered going self employed - the job doesnt matter.
the ONLY way going self employed is you are doing that, WOrking for yourself directly, ( for example,guy on here as tona valeting )
you arent, you are going working for someone else so to speak.
i know a few couriers. i would be staying on the books espeically with a £2k van :lipsrsealed:
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oh and vivaro :lipsrsealed: and :laugh: at some people on here, but i wouldnt have one :wink:
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http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/RENAULT-MASTER-LM35-DCI-LWB-2-2-DCI-TRANSIT-SIZED-VAN-BLUE-2001-/380434102848?pt=UK_Commercial_Trucks&hash=item5893a3ba40#ht_1656wt_1397
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/52-PLATE-FIAT-DUCATO-VAN-JTD-NO-VAT-/180861816283?pt=UK_Commercial_Trucks&hash=item2a1c344ddb#ht_500wt_1416
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2001-VAUXHALL-MOVANO-DTI-3500-LWB-/380423012225?pt=UK_Commercial_Trucks&hash=item5892fa7f81
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Little extra income by renting advertising space on the side of the van. Not much but every little helps! :wink:
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"vw transporters are good as long as you don't get one with ceramic cylinder liners"
not my experience, hatefull little vans, they really are too small, had one when i worked for vw, junk. I think no matter what i do van wise it's a risk, if i lease i risk loosing out cash wise, if i own i risk expensive repair costs, the way i see it, if i leese i'm not going to make any more money and i'll keep treading water and not get anywhere financially which ultimately will end up with bailiffs as the debt is getting bigger than my wages can cope with, if i take a risk with my own van it could destroy me and i'd have the bailiffs knocking within a month, or it could be alright and in 6 months everything would be alot more rosier, at which point there will be so many more parcels as peak will be starting again that i can afford to lease if i have to. I'm gonna go for it, cross my fingers and give it everything iv'e got, i can stay out till 9pm monday to saturday so i can just bang em out and make some money! I am now more torn than ever on deciding what van to get! Basicly their all sh!t is what we've established so far. Usually, when i'm not having to put my own fuel in, i swear by the transit, love it to death. I've had my work van for a year now, from new, FWD LWB, not heard a peep from it but only get 450 miles to £120! Renault Masters, worked for ambulance service, they did break down but they were old and had monumental mileage, however the bodmin wagon on a 06 plate did 300,000 on the same clutch and gearbox!!! Which leads me onto the Sprinter, which replaced the master ambulances, OMG not good, gearboxes, panard arms that snap after 5k, constant turbo hose failure and a raft of electrical faults, VW Crafter aka the Mercedes Sprinter, Anyone had a Peugeot? I had one bloke tell me he's getting 55mpg out of his. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!!
Ian - Now going bald
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Little extra income by renting advertising space on the side of the van. Not much but every little helps! :wink:
not a chance, dash had 2 sign written vans, they were both banned!
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do you want an opinion from a self employed courier ???
<--- self employed courier
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"vw transporters are good as long as you don't get one with ceramic cylinder liners"
1 not my experience, hatefull little vans, they really are too small, had one when i worked for vw, junk. I think no matter what i do van wise it's a risk, if i lease i risk loosing out cash wise, if i own i risk expensive repair costs, the way i see it, if i leese i'm not going to make any more money and i'll keep treading water and not get anywhere financially which ultimately will end up with bailiffs as the debt is getting bigger than my wages can cope with, if i take a risk with my own van it could destroy me and i'd have the bailiffs knocking within a month, or it could be alright and in 6 months everything would be alot more rosier, at which point there will be so many more parcels as peak will be starting again that i can afford to lease if i have to. I'm gonna go for it, cross my fingers and give it everything iv'e got, i can stay out till 9pm monday to saturday so i can just bang em out and make some money! I am now more torn than ever on deciding what van to get! Basicly their all sh!t is what we've established so far. Usually, when i'm not having to put my own fuel in, 2 i swear by the transit, love it to death. I've had my work van for a year now, from new, FWD LWB, not heard a peep from it but only get 450 miles to £120! Renault Masters, worked for ambulance service, they did break down but they were old and had monumental mileage, however the bodmin wagon on a 06 plate did 300,000 on the same clutch and gearbox!!! Which leads me onto the 3 Sprinter, which replaced the master ambulances, OMG not good, gearboxes, panard arms that snap after 5k, constant turbo hose failure and a raft of electrical faults, VW Crafter aka the Mercedes Sprinter, 4 Anyone had a Peugeot? I had one bloke tell me he's getting 55mpg out of his. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!!
Ian - Now going bald
1 My old boss has one, 98 on an s, over 200k on it still going strong, never had a breakdown, he ran it for ages low on all fluids, took a full big can of oil to put it on minimum, that was 5 years ago and it's still going and he is a builder so it gets abuse, and you can get them the size of a luton transit.
2 Old transits were good apart from fuel, new ones have a lot of problems once they hit 20-30k, clutch, flywheel, alternator, starter motor and gearbox.
3 Old ones were very good, a truck mechanic that I use has a 98 plate lwb high roof that has done over 350k, never broke down, on same engine and gearbox and he has never had to do and major work to it apart from the suspension collapsed, but he had over double the weight he should in it going down a farm road so that was his fault.
4 I would say that is bollocks, don't know much about Peugeot vans, except they are French, which is enough reason for me never to have one. :grin:
5 Most importantly, GOOD LUCK!!! hope all goes well
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With no debt and owning my boat outright very easilly thankyou very much, you can't rip me to shreads on that one as iv'e done it before. Right, where do i start. My service center employs 4 drivers on a full time basis, my route will have a legally binding contract which both partys must fulfill, they can't give my route away and i can't just take a day off, when i have holiday or am sick i must get somebody to do my route for me, i have a mate who moonlights for £5 per hour and will cover, iv'e aggreed a bonus of £30 per day if he reaches target (70 stops before 7pm). My service center used to be a DHL site bringing in 30-40 parcels on my route when quiet and 120 - 140 during peak (sept - feb) up the road was the former HDNL site, now closed, the two businesses were merged together and now we get all there work aswell. They were always bussier than we were so now i'm getting between 70-80 per day when it's dead and i don't even want to think about peak, because my agent is DASH who own the contract with yodel for west cornwall, i can have help from them as and when i need it. In the event of dash loosing the contract i'm safe as my contract must be passed on to the incoming service partner, yodel will always and do favour service partners over full time employed staff as sh1t drivers are easier to get rid of that way. My contract with Yodel IS SAFE.
Fair point with the vivaro, iv'e heard good things economy and reliability wise about the fiat ducato. Probably worth a look, could do with something bigger tbh but sprinters and transits are a no no, i can fix my own van and have access to cheap parts and tyres, really i need a renault master simply for the fact that if it goes wrong i have well conected people.
I find it easier to deal with the numbers on a daily basis, it's all in the detail with a small turnover so i think small for now and take each day as it comes. Either way i've got nothing to loose and i'm heading for trully sh!t times if i carry on like this so f**k it, give it my all and try and make a sucsess of it! Keep it coming! At first i'm thinking c**ts but your all helping me to see it from a different angle,
Many thanks, ian
not trying to rip you to shreds. just trying to get you to think this through properly. i run my own business so i speak from experience.
please elaborate. so far you've only given us your potential earnings in a full time job. lets see some costs for when you've bought the boat and you're floating around semi retired. i.e
1. income. so you're gonna work part time?
2. living costs. food, phone, van, van insurance, tax etc.
3. running costs for the boat. moaring, fuel (if any), insurance? (not sure if you need it), maintenance.
4. if i've missed anything then please feel free to add.
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Wear and tear £0.08 pence per mile (aprox 100miles per day 6 days per week)
This seems like a very optimistic figure.
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Cheezuz. 70+ drops a day?! :shocked: and our drivers at Habitat complained about more than 20 a day :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:
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Any other trades you're good at?
Got bored of a wayne kerr boss only wanting to pay 30 quid a day just because he could, told him to shove it up his arsenic and going well now.
Maintenance and mobile servicing + light repairs. Occasionally sell a car and haven't worked a Friday since!
Me and my partner pulled in 378 profit yesterday! Have to be sensible and just pay ourselves 50 a day ATM because we're both at home, just so the business account is filling up for tools, advertising and a new work vehicle.
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With no debt and owning my boat outright very easilly thankyou very much, you can't rip me to shreads on that one as iv'e done it before. Right, where do i start. My service center employs 4 drivers on a full time basis, my route will have a legally binding contract which both partys must fulfill, they can't give my route away and i can't just take a day off, when i have holiday or am sick i must get somebody to do my route for me, i have a mate who moonlights for £5 per hour and will cover, iv'e aggreed a bonus of £30 per day if he reaches target (70 stops before 7pm). My service center used to be a DHL site bringing in 30-40 parcels on my route when quiet and 120 - 140 during peak (sept - feb) up the road was the former HDNL site, now closed, the two businesses were merged together and now we get all there work aswell. They were always bussier than we were so now i'm getting between 70-80 per day when it's dead and i don't even want to think about peak, because my agent is DASH who own the contract with yodel for west cornwall, i can have help from them as and when i need it. In the event of dash loosing the contract i'm safe as my contract must be passed on to the incoming service partner, yodel will always and do favour service partners over full time employed staff as sh1t drivers are easier to get rid of that way. My contract with Yodel IS SAFE.
Fair point with the vivaro, iv'e heard good things economy and reliability wise about the fiat ducato. Probably worth a look, could do with something bigger tbh but sprinters and transits are a no no, i can fix my own van and have access to cheap parts and tyres, really i need a renault master simply for the fact that if it goes wrong i have well conected people.
I find it easier to deal with the numbers on a daily basis, it's all in the detail with a small turnover so i think small for now and take each day as it comes. Either way i've got nothing to loose and i'm heading for trully sh!t times if i carry on like this so f**k it, give it my all and try and make a sucsess of it! Keep it coming! At first i'm thinking c**ts but your all helping me to see it from a different angle,
Many thanks, ian
not trying to rip you to shreds. just trying to get you to think this through properly. i run my own business so i speak from experience.
please elaborate. so far you've only given us your potential earnings in a full time job. lets see some costs for when you've bought the boat and you're floating around semi retired. i.e
1. income. so you're gonna work part time?
2. living costs. food, phone, van, van insurance, tax etc.
3. running costs for the boat. moaring, fuel (if any), insurance? (not sure if you need it), maintenance.
4. if i've missed anything then please feel free to add.
1.part time £100 pw will do it
2. Living costs, firewood and coal, no van, no insurance, car only for summer dubbing.
3. mooring - free - £10 pw. Maintainance- steel hull nice and easy.
4. Electrics can run of the land for around £2 per day , i'll keep around half a ton of fuel in the tank for manuvering purposes only.
when i need stuff i'll work, but i can grow / catch my own food, don't need tv or crap like that, as i said, hermit style! Any more info you need?
Thanks for all your comments, i'm gonna go with the lease van. i'll continue to earn what im earning as employed until peak when the numbers go mental and see how it goes.