Books On a Budget

If you’re a university student, you know how expensive course textbooks can be. You can easily spend hundreds of dollars per semester to buy books that you won’t need to keep after that course ends, the majority of those course books cannot be sold back to the college bookstore.

Fortunately, there are a few simple tips and tricks you can use to save money on your textbooks.

First, don’t run immediately to the campus bookstore and buy your books at full price. Your campus bookstore will generally have the highest markup on textbooks. Always shop around before you buy by going to the campus bookstore, off-campus bookstores, and searching online one avenue is BookByte.com, and this service allows you to browse books to buy and rewards you when you sell your soon unnecessary textbooks back to them.

Begin your shopping at your campus bookstore first and write down the ISBN of your textbook, the unique identifying number that is usually listed on the back cover of a book above its bar code. By using the ISBN, you guarantee you are searching for the exact book and edition you need – this is critical, since there are many variations of that textbook floating around.

The majority of online book retailers use the ISBN within their search results to narrow down the amount of textbooks offered to you, this also encourages you to double check the edition and age of the book.

Next, start looking for used copies of your textbook. There are many sites online, including used book retailers and auction sites, which sell used items at rock-bottom prices. Believe it or not, one of the best places to look for used textbooks is on eBay. This very popular online auction site offers hundreds and even thousands of books at any given time.

Tips for using eBay:

• Read the fine print regarding the shipping costs. Books can be expensive to mail due to their weight and size, and this can make a relatively cheap purchase too expensive. Ask for your book to be shipped by USPS mail, which should bring down the cost of shipping considerably.
• Start your search WAY before the time you need the book, bid often and early, if you aren’t the ‘winner’ you may still have time to bid on another copy, before your course schedule begins. Give yourself time to bid a few times, and on different auctions as well.
• With any EBay purchase, research the seller’s feedback before placing a bid. Some book stores are now listing hundreds of books at great prices, but there is a chance that the book you actually bid on is out of stock. This information about the seller and their selling habits will be reflected in their individual feedback.

A great place online to begin your search is Search for Low Cost New and Used College Textbooks: Buy or Sell! which sells a variety of items useful for your college experience. Once again, make sure you use the ISBN number to check to make sure you are looking at the correct version of your textbook.

Be attentive to the condition listed of the used text. A text that is listed as damaged, waterlogged, or heavily highlighted may not be the best choice. In addition, if your text has a workbook or lab manual component, you will want to make sure the previous user has not filled out the workbook pages.

Another option for students is to purchase an “international version” of your textbook. These are exact copies of your textbook that are sold inexpensively in Asia or Europe. Frequently, to cut costs, the manufacturer has bound the book as a paperback and has eliminated colored illustrations in favor of black and white illustrations. Other than these changes, the book will be exactly the same – but expect to save up to 90 percent of the cover price. Keep in mind, however, that you may have to spend extra money to ship your book to you.

If you are still without a required book- it is always worth checking with the course professor to see whether he or she will allow you to use an older version of your text. Sometimes, such outdated versions can be bought for a few dollars online.

However, if the professor thinks the material has changed substantially since the previous edition, it is not a good idea to use the textbook, no matter how inexpensive it is.

Finally, consider checking out your textbook from the campus library instead of purchasing it. This effectively makes your textbook free — but you will need to be dedicated enough to go to the library frequently.

In some cases the professor will make his or her textbook available on a short-term loan basis — two or four hours at a time.

Make sure that your textbook is available at the library before you decide to go this route.

Going to college is expensive enough, buying the required books doesn’t have to break the bank, when you can find your course textbook inexpensively. You don’t have to pay “sticker price” at the on-campus bookstore — there are many different ways of buying your textbook at a bargain price.