How to Price a Load: The Math Brokers Don't Show You

When a broker posts a load, they already know the market rate. They know what the shipper paid last month, what competing carriers have accepted recently, and what margin they're targeting. You're negotiating without that context.

That doesn't mean you're powerless — it means you need your own math. Here's how to calculate what a load actually needs to pay, how to read market rate data, and how to stop accepting rates that don't cover your costs.

Start With Your Cost Per Mile

Every pricing decision starts here. If you don't know your cost per mile, you can't price a load — you're just guessing.

Your cost per mile has two parts:

Variable costs — costs that increase with miles driven:

• Fuel (your biggest variable cost — calculate from actual MPG and current diesel price)
• Tires (spread the cost of a set over expected mileage)
• Maintenance (oil changes, filters, routine servicing — cost over expected miles)
• Driver pay (if you have a driver; for owner-operators, this is your take-home)

Fixed costs — costs that don't change with miles (divide by monthly miles to get a per-mile figure):

• Truck payment or lease
• Trailer payment or lease
• Insurance (commercial auto, cargo, physical damage, occupational accident)
• Permits and registrations
• Factoring fees (if applicable)
• Administrative and software costs

Add variable and fixed costs per mile together. That's your break-even rate — the rate below which you are losing money on every mile.

Say your total cost per mile works out to $1.85. Any load paying less than $1.85 per loaded mile is a loss before you consider deadhead. That number is your floor.

Expense tracking that categorizes your actual costs by type gives you a real cost-per-mile calculation rather than an estimate. The further your estimate is from reality, the more likely you are to accept loads that aren't actually profitable.

Account for Deadhead in Your Rate

A load's rate is posted per loaded mile. But you don't earn the deadhead miles getting to the pickup. Those empty miles still cost fuel and time.

The number to think about is revenue per total mile driven — loaded rate × loaded miles, divided by total miles (loaded + deadhead).

Example: A load pays $2.50/mile for 400 loaded miles. Pickup is 120 miles away.

• Gross revenue: $2.50 × 400 = $1,000
• Total miles: 400 + 120 = 520
• Revenue per total mile: $1,000 ÷ 520 = $1.92/mile

If your cost per mile is $1.85, this load looks fine at $2.50/mile loaded — but it's actually only netting you $0.07/mile of margin after deadhead. One unexpected delay wipes that out.

Contrast that with a shorter-deadhead load at $2.20/mile for 500 loaded miles with 30 miles of deadhead:

• Gross revenue: $2.20 × 500 = $1,100
• Total miles: 530
• Revenue per total mile: $1,100 ÷ 530 = $2.08/mile

The $2.20 load with less deadhead is more profitable than the $2.50 one — but you'd only know that if you ran the math.

Read the Market Before You Counter

Brokers post at prices they expect to negotiate from. The question is: what's the real market rate for this lane?

DAT Rate View and Truckstop.com both publish recent actual rates paid for lanes — not posted rates, but what trucks have accepted. Before you counter a broker, pull the current average for the lane you're being offered. You're looking for the average rate per mile for that corridor over the last 30 days, and whether rates are trending up or down.

If the posted rate is at or above market, your room to negotiate is limited. If the posted rate is 15–20% below market, you have data to back a counter.

Know the difference between spot rates (one-time, market-priced loads) and contract rates (ongoing agreements at negotiated rates). Spot rates fluctuate with load-to-truck ratios. Contract rates are steadier but take relationship-building to secure.

Build Your Pricing Formula

Here's a working formula you can use for every load:

1. Minimum acceptable rate per loaded mile

(Cost per mile × Total miles) ÷ Loaded miles = Minimum rate per loaded mile

Example: Cost per mile = $1.85, loaded miles = 400, deadhead = 100, total miles = 500

($1.85 × 500) ÷ 400 = $925 ÷ 400 = $2.31/loaded mile minimum

This is break-even. Anything below this on this load means you're paying to haul it.

2. Target rate (with margin)

Add your target margin on top of break-even. If you're targeting a 20% operating margin:

$2.31 × 1.20 = $2.77/loaded mile target

This is what you'd like to get. Your opening counter should be at or near this number.

3. Walk-away rate

The minimum you'll accept. For most owner-operators, this is break-even plus a small buffer — say $2.31 + $0.10 = $2.41. Below that, the truck stays parked or you find a different load.

What to Do With the Numbers at the Table

You now have three numbers: your target, your floor, and the posted rate. Here's how to use them:

If the posted rate is above your target: Accept or counter slightly to see if there's more. Don't leave money by reflexively accepting the first number.

If the posted rate is between your target and your floor: Counter with your target. Most brokers post expecting a counter. A professional counter with a specific number ("I can do $2.65/mile on this lane") is more effective than a round number or a complaint about the rate.

If the posted rate is below your floor: Counter with your minimum acceptable rate and explain briefly ("My cost on this lane with the deadhead out of Memphis is $2.45 minimum"). If they can't meet it, pass on the load. Running a below-cost load to keep moving is worse than sitting for a few hours.

If the lane is oversupplied (many trucks, few loads): The market is against you. You can still push back, but expectations should be lower. This is also when your broker relationships matter most — a broker who knows your reliability may offer something off the board before it's posted.

Factor In Time, Not Just Miles

Rates per mile don't capture everything. A 400-mile load with two drop-and-hooks and a long unload at delivery pays the same per-mile as a 400-mile direct load — but it takes more hours.

Think in terms of rate per hour when evaluating loads with unusual time requirements:

Load A and B pay the same on paper. Load B costs you 5 extra hours and probably one more night on the road. That difference matters to your monthly revenue, your home time, and your health.

Accessorial charges (detention, stop pay, TONU) exist precisely because time has value. Billing detention correctly on slow-unload loads is part of making the rate per hour work in your favor.

Know When to Pass

The most important pricing discipline is knowing when to not take a load.

Sitting for a few hours while you find better freight is usually better than hauling a below-cost load that burns fuel, adds miles to your truck, and occupies a delivery slot at a time when better loads are available.

Owner-operators who run every load that comes in — regardless of rate — often have high gross revenue and low margins. The discipline of pricing a load correctly, and walking away when the numbers don't work, is what separates profitable operations from busy ones.

Load management built for owner-operators tracks revenue per load and per-mile averages so you can see, over time, which lanes and brokers actually contribute to profitability and which ones look good at first glance but consistently under-deliver.

Putting It All Together

Pricing a load isn't intuition — it's a short calculation you run before every acceptance:

1. What does this load pay per loaded mile?
2. What's my cost per total mile (including deadhead)?
3. Does this load meet my margin target?
4. What does the market say this lane is worth right now?
5. Do the time requirements change the math?

Five questions. Two minutes. The difference between a truck that's running profitably and one that's staying busy but not getting ahead.

Truck Command's expense tracking gives you an accurate cost-per-mile calculation from your actual expenses. Pair it with load management to track revenue per load, lane profitability, and margin over time — the data that tells you whether your pricing is working.

Plans start at $20/month with a 14-day free trial, no credit card required. Run the math before you accept the load.