A Ford Transit 250 holds about 250 cubic feet of cargo and roughly 3,500 pounds of payload: a full pallet of freight, or a three-seat sofa plus a dining set, or about 180 Amazon-sized boxes. It parks in your driveway, fuels for $90 and drives on the license you already have. That is why the cargo van is the cheapest serious entry into transportation, and why so many people buy one before they have figured out who will pay them to drive it.
This guide covers how to start a cargo van business the way working owner-operators do it: pick a revenue model before you pick a van, get the DOT and insurance side right the first time, price by the mile and the hour without losing money on empty miles, and land the first five paying jobs. Expect to spend $8,000 to $15,000 to launch with a financed used van, or $40,000 to $60,000 if you buy newer and insure it properly, and 3 to 8 weeks from decision to first paid load.
What a cargo van business actually looks like day to day
There is no single cargo van business. There are four, and they share a vehicle but not much else.
Local delivery and courier moves things across town for businesses: auto parts, catering, print jobs, pharmacy and lab runs. It is 8 to 12 hours a day on weekdays, paid by the hour ($40 to $75) or by the stop ($12 to $35). The best version is a contracted route you run daily for the same customer.
Furniture, appliance and marketplace delivery serves furniture stores, thrift stores, estate sales and people who just bought a couch on Facebook Marketplace. Jobs pay $75 to $250, are heavy, and cluster on evenings and weekends. A local furniture store typically pays a contract delivery company $65 to $110 per delivery within 25 miles and expects two people.
Expedite freight is time-critical loads for carriers and brokers, 300 to 1,200 miles at a time, at $0.90 to $1.60 a loaded mile. You sleep in the van and can be gone two weeks. A 500-mile van load books between $500 and $800 most weeks, with 60 to 100 miles of deadhead to reach it.
Platform work (Amazon Flex, Roadie, Curri, GoShare, Frayt) pays per block or per job: the fastest first dollar and the worst long-term margin, because the platform sets the price.
What kills new van businesses is the same in all four: unpaid miles. Drive 40 minutes to a $60 job and you have already lost. The operators who last think in revenue per hour and per mile, and decline work that fails either test.
Step 1: Pick your revenue model before you pick your van
The model decides the van, the insurance, the registrations and the marketing. Three questions settle it: Do you want to be home every night? Can you lift 150 pounds with a helper, all day? Do you want to find customers, or do you want a dispatcher to find them?
| Model | Home nightly | Gross per year, solo | Hardest part |
|---|---|---|---|
| Local courier and contract routes | Yes | $60,000–$95,000 | Landing the first route contract |
| Furniture and marketplace delivery | Yes | $55,000–$90,000 | Physical wear, weekends, two-person jobs |
| Expedite freight | No, 1–3 weeks out | $100,000–$150,000 | Deadhead, living in the van, waiting for loads |
| Platform gig work | Yes | $35,000–$60,000 | Rate cuts you cannot control |
Most owners who last blend two: contract routes on weekday mornings plus furniture jobs in the afternoons and Saturdays, or platform work in month one to cover the van payment while direct customers build.
Choosing the van
The Ford Transit (250 or 350, high roof) is the default: parts everywhere, 14 to 16 mpg, 3,300 to 4,000 pounds of payload. The Ram ProMaster is cheaper used and has the widest floor, but front-wheel drive struggles loaded in snow. The Mercedes Sprinter gets 19 to 22 mpg on diesel and holds value, but one dealer repair can run $2,000. For expedite, buy the longest high roof you can; brokers post loads by pallet count and a three-pallet extended van books more than a two-pallet one. Used 2019 to 2022 vans with 80,000 to 130,000 miles run $20,000 to $34,000; new high roofs list at $52,000 to $65,000. Finance through a credit union rather than the dealer.
Watch out: Pay $150 to $250 for an independent pre-purchase inspection on any used van, and ask for engine hours, not just miles. Fleet vans look clean and have idled for 3,000 hours.
Step 2: Legal setup and the registrations this business needs
Form an LLC ($50 to $500 depending on the state; California adds an $800 annual franchise tax). A sole proprietorship is legal but a bad idea when you drive a 9,000-pound vehicle onto other people’s property. Get a free EIN from the IRS the same afternoon, open a business checking account, and title and insure the van in the LLC’s name. Then the registrations, which depend on your model:
- Business license. Most cities and counties require one ($25 to $150 a year). Some also want a home-occupation permit if a commercial vehicle lives in your driveway.
- USDOT number. Required for interstate commerce in a vehicle of 10,001 pounds GVWR or more, and many states require one for intrastate commercial operation at any weight. Check the GVWR sticker on the door jamb: a Transit 350 or Sprinter 3500 is usually over the line, a Transit 250 or ProMaster 2500 usually under. Registration is free through the FMCSA Unified Registration System.
- Operating authority (MC number). If you haul other people’s freight across state lines for pay, you need for-hire authority from FMCSA: $300, plus a BOC-3 process agent filing ($25 to $50) and insurance on file, and 3 to 4 weeks to go active. Nearly every expedite broker and load board requires it, as does Amazon Relay.
- Unified Carrier Registration, about $40 a year for 0 to 2 vehicles, if you hold interstate authority.
- State intrastate authority. Texas, California, Ohio and others register for-hire carriers operating inside the state. Search “[your state] intrastate motor carrier registration.”
Vans under 10,001 pounds GVWR are exempt from most federal motor carrier safety regulations: no medical card, no ELD, no hours-of-service limits, which is why many operators deliberately buy under the line. If you only deliver locally for local businesses you may need none of the federal items. If you plan expedite, file in week one; authority is your longest lead time.
Step 3: Insurance that will actually pay a claim
Your personal auto policy excludes business use. The first claim with a paid load in the back gets denied. Get commercial coverage before the first job.
| Coverage | What it does | Typical annual cost, one van |
|---|---|---|
| Commercial auto liability | Injuries and damage you cause while driving | $3,500–$8,000 |
| Physical damage | Collision and comprehensive on your van | $1,200–$2,800 |
| Cargo insurance | Damage or theft of freight you carry | $900–$2,500 for $100,000 |
| General liability | Injuries and property damage while loading and unloading | $500–$1,200 |
| Occupational accident or workers’ comp | Your injuries (occ-acc) or employees’ (workers’ comp) | $1,200–$3,000 |
FMCSA’s minimum liability for for-hire vans under 10,001 pounds is $300,000 and $750,000 above it, filed by the insurer directly. Brokers, though, almost universally want a $1,000,000 auto liability certificate and $100,000 cargo, so quote at those limits from the start. New authorities pay a premium that typically drops 20 to 35 percent after two clean years. Expedite operators should find an agent who writes trucking, because standard carriers will not touch a new MC number.
Step 4: Equipment and startup costs
The van is the business. Everything else is a few hundred dollars of gear that stops you from damaging the load.
| Item | Lean setup | Full setup |
|---|---|---|
| Van (down payment on financed used van vs. newer van purchased) | $4,000 | $28,000–$55,000 |
| E-track or load bars, straps, shelving | $400 | $1,800 |
| Moving blankets (12–24), stretch wrap, corner protectors | $200 | $450 |
| Hand truck, four-wheel furniture dolly, appliance dolly | $180 | $700 |
| Insurance, first-quarter deposit | $1,200 | $3,000 |
| LLC, EIN, business license, FMCSA filings | $150 | $1,000 |
| Dash cam, ramp, backup camera | $150 | $1,500 |
| Vehicle lettering or magnets | $80 | $900 (partial wrap) |
| Website, domain, Google Business Profile | $50 | $300 |
| Fuel and operating cash for month one | $1,500 | $3,000 |
| Total | $7,900 | $40,000–$68,000 |
Expedite adds an inverter and portable fridge ($400 to $900), a sleeping platform ($300 to $800) and a load board subscription ($40 to $150 a month). The first loads pay for all of it.
Step 5: Pricing by the mile, the hour and the job
Start with cost per mile, because every quote has to clear it. A solo van running 45,000 miles a year: fuel at 15 mpg and $3.60 a gallon is $0.24 a mile; the payment on a $28,000 loan is about $0.15; insurance at $6,000 is $0.13; maintenance, tires and a repair reserve are $0.10 to $0.14; registrations and software add $0.04. Call it $0.66 to $0.70 a mile before you pay yourself. An expedite van running 110,000 miles a year spreads fixed costs down to about $0.45 a mile, which is why it can take a $1.00 load and still profit.
| Service | How it is priced | Typical 2026 range |
|---|---|---|
| Local same-day delivery, within 15 miles | Flat rate | $45–$95 |
| Van with driver, hourly, 2-hour minimum | Per hour | $55–$85 |
| Contracted daily route (pharmacy, lab, parts) | Per day or per stop | $180–$320 a day, or $12–$28 a stop |
| Furniture or appliance delivery, one person | Per job | $85–$150 |
| Furniture delivery, two people, stairs or assembly | Per job | $150–$300 |
| Marketplace pickup and delivery | Per job plus mileage | $75–$140 within 20 miles, then $2 a mile |
| Expedite freight | Per loaded mile | $0.90–$1.60 |
| Small move, two people | Per hour | $120–$180 |
Rules working operators follow: a $65 minimum on everything, the second person billed as a line item ($35 to $50 an hour), a stair fee ($25 per flight past the first) and wait time (15 minutes free, then $1 a minute) in writing. On expedite, never accept a load without knowing the deadhead to the pickup and the odds of a reload from the delivery city; $1.40 a mile into a dead region can be worse than $1.05 into Chicago.
The monthly math for a local operator: four furniture jobs a day at an average $140, five days a week, is about $12,000 a month gross. At 1,800 miles that is roughly $1,250 in per-mile costs plus $1,600 to $2,400 in helper pay, leaving $8,000 to $9,000 before taxes. Reaching four jobs a day takes most people four to eight months.
Step 6: Get online and look like a company, not a guy with a van
Store managers, brokers and marketplace buyers all look you up before they call. They need to find a business name, a phone number that gets answered, a service area, what you move, starting-at prices, photos of your actual van and loads, and a quote form that takes under a minute.
You can have Restart build the site: describe the business, the services, the area, the pricing and how you want people to reach you, and it builds the pages, writes the copy, designs the site and publishes it to a real URL. When a rate changes, ask and it changes. For a one-van company that is four pages: services with pricing, service area, photos, and a quote form. Restart’s page on local businesses shows what that looks like.
Then the pieces that make a small transport company look established:
- Google Business Profile under “Delivery service” or “Courier service,” with a service area, 10 to 20 photos of the van and real jobs, and hours you will actually answer. Ask every happy customer for a review by text within an hour.
- Vehicle lettering. Even $80 of magnets with the name and number turns every job into an ad.
- A business phone line forwarding to your cell, with a company-name voicemail and a text-back auto-reply. Missed calls are the biggest leak in a delivery business.
- A certificate of insurance as a PDF. Commercial customers ask on the first call, and sending it in thirty seconds wins the job.
Step 7: Land the first five paying jobs
None of these channels is “post on social media and wait.”
Local delivery and furniture
- Walk into furniture, mattress, appliance and thrift stores with a one-page rate sheet and your COI. Ask: “Who does your deliveries now, and what happens when they’re booked out?” The manager usually decides on the spot.
- Marketplace buyers. Post in local buy/sell groups: “Bought something that won’t fit in your car? Pickup and delivery from $75.” Answer every “anyone have a truck?” post.
- Estate sale companies, auction houses and property managers. Every sale ends with a buyer who needs a dresser moved; every apartment turnover needs furniture out. The junk removal side of that work pairs naturally with a van.
- Platforms as a bridge. GoShare, Dolly, Curri, Roadie and Frayt will hand you jobs in week one. Take them to learn the work, and leave a card with every customer.
Contract routes
Call independent pharmacies, medical and dental labs, auto parts stores and print shops with a fixed daily price for a defined route. Labs and pharmacies want reliability over price; a medical courier route at $200 to $320 a day can anchor the whole business.
Expedite
Once authority is active, register on an expedite load board (Sylectus and similar boards list van loads specifically; DAT and Truckstop carry some). Better for the first six months: lease on with an established expedite carrier. They take 25 to 40 percent but supply loads, a fuel card and insurance, and you learn which lanes reload. Or hire an independent dispatcher at 5 to 10 percent of gross; the freight dispatching guide explains that relationship from the other side.
For the first five jobs, quote the low end of the ranges above, not below them: $75 for a marketplace delivery, $120 for a two-person couch. Say exactly what is included (“two of us, blankets and straps, one flight of stairs, within 20 miles”), take a $25 to $50 card deposit on anything booked more than a day out, and text a photo of the load at pickup and drop-off.
Tip: After each job, ask “who else do you know that needs something moved this month?” The first 20 customers almost always come from the first 5.
Step 8: Operate well and know when to add the second van
Scheduling. Batch jobs by geography and discount flexible timing (“$95 today, $75 Thursday when I’m on that side of town”). Set a hard cutoff for same-day bookings.
Paperwork. A written agreement even for a marketplace couch: what you are moving, the price, stairs and wait clauses, and a damage clause that limits liability to declared value. Invoice commercial customers weekly on net-15. On expedite, the broker’s rate confirmation is the contract; read the detention and layover terms before you accept.
Maintenance. Oil every 5,000 miles, tires every 40,000 to 50,000 ($900 to $1,300 a set), and a $2,000 repair reserve in a separate account. Transmissions and rear differentials are the expensive surprises on high-mileage Transits.
The first helper. Hire the moment you start turning down two-person furniture jobs. Pay $20 to $28 an hour as a W-2 employee (workers’ comp runs 5 to 9 percent of payroll for delivery labor), or contract a moving-labor company for busy days. A cash-paid helper plus one injury claim ends the business.
The second van. Add it when you have turned down more than $2,000 a week for two months and have a driver you trust. What breaks: you stop driving and start dispatching, insurance more than doubles because you are adding a driver you do not control, and the new unit needs its own steady route to cover a $1,500-a-month cost floor. Many operators find a 16-foot box truck is the better second unit, because it opens small moves at $150 to $200 an hour.
How much can you make?
Honest numbers for 2026, before income tax.
| Level | Volume | Monthly gross | Monthly costs | Monthly profit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Side income (evenings and Saturdays) | 8–10 furniture and marketplace jobs a week at $110 | $4,000 | $1,400 | $2,600 |
| Full-time solo, local | 1 contract route at $1,100 a week plus 10 furniture jobs at $130 | $10,000 | $3,800 | $6,200 |
| Full-time solo, expedite | 9,000 loaded miles at $1.20, 1,500 deadhead | $10,800 | $4,600 | $6,200 |
| Small team (2 vans, 1 driver, 1 helper) | 2 routes plus 30 furniture jobs a week | $24,000 | $14,500 | $9,500 |
A solo local operator with a full calendar clears $60,000 to $80,000 a year. A solo expedite operator out three weeks a month clears $70,000 to $95,000 and pays for it in time at home. A two-van company run by an owner who still drives tops out around $110,000 to $130,000; beyond that each additional van nets 15 to 20 percent after the driver is paid.
Mistakes that sink new cargo van business owners
- Buying the van before the customers. A $700 payment with no route is how people end up doing $18-an-hour gig work to cover it. Fix: line up one contract, or run platform jobs in a rented van for two weekends first.
- Driving on personal auto insurance. Denied claims and, after a bad accident, personal bankruptcy. Fix: commercial auto from day one, cargo and general liability the moment you carry someone else’s property.
- Not counting deadhead. A $1.30 load with 250 empty miles to reach it is a $0.95 load. Fix: all-in miles on every quote, and a minimum on every local job.
- Taking two-person jobs alone. Back injuries and dropped appliances. Fix: price the second person in, or decline solo jobs over 150 pounds.
- No written damage terms. A scratched $3,000 dresser becomes a $3,000 demand. Fix: declared-value liability in a signed agreement, photos at pickup and delivery.
- Ignoring FMCSA because “it’s just a van.” Hauling interstate for hire without authority draws fines that start around $10,000 per violation. Fix: check your GVWR and model against Step 2 and file early.
Your first 30 days
Week 1
- Choose your model and write down your price list from Step 5.
- File the LLC, get the EIN, open the business bank account.
- If you need operating authority, file the MC application, BOC-3 and UCR now.
- Get three commercial auto quotes at $1,000,000 liability and $100,000 cargo.
- Build the website on Restart and create your Google Business Profile.
Week 2
- Buy the van after a pre-purchase inspection; title and insure it in the LLC’s name.
- Outfit it: E-track or load bars, blankets, stretch wrap, hand truck, furniture dolly, straps, dash cam.
- Order magnets or a rear-door decal; set up the business phone line and an invoicing app.
- Write your one-page service agreement and rate sheet.
Week 3
- Sign up with two or three delivery platforms and run your first jobs.
- Visit 15 furniture, appliance, mattress and thrift stores with the rate sheet and COI.
- Post the pickup-and-delivery offer in five local buy/sell groups and on Nextdoor.
- Call 10 pharmacies, labs, parts stores and print shops about a daily route.
Week 4
- Complete five direct jobs at introductory pricing; photograph each load and ask for a review by text.
- Follow up with every store from week 3.
- Review revenue, miles and hours per job; cut anything under $50 an hour all-in.
- If you filed for authority, confirm the insurance filings and register on a load board.
