Paying Less for that Textbook You’ll Never Use

This is a guest post by Stephen Sharpe. Write a guest post about saving money at college.

There is a story that has been told and retold millions of times since higher education became a fad a couple generations ago. It goes something like this: student buys textbook; student goes into bankruptcy; book goes home with student in plastic seal; student opens book on first day of class; student never opens book again; semester ends; student sells back textbook for $.47 with a 97.8% net loss. But don’t worry, they’ll probably round up to at least $.50.

So how can you avoid living this sorry tale? Unfortunately, you can’t completely avoid it. However, you can cut back on your losses. 

Compare Prices on Textbooks to Save Money 

There are several vendors that can offer you better prices than what your college bookstore offers. Half.com, and Amazon.com usually offer better prices than college bookstores. When looking for textbooks, it helps to find out each book’s International Standard Book Number (ISBN). The ISBN is a number found in each book that can help you to properly and correctly identify the book no matter what version it is. It is a pain to order a textbook on the Internet only to discover that it is the wrong edition. Using the ISBN can help you to find books quickly and easily.

Record each book price into a table in a spreadsheet program like Excel, Word, or Google Docs. Make sure you take a look at both used and new prices. If it is a book that you don’t think you’ll sell back, you may want to try to find a nicer version. If you do go the online route, you’ll have to order your book with enough time to allow the books to arrive. Be sure to take into account that online sellers often require shipping fees. Sometimes the difference is so negligible that it may be better to simply buy the book at the bookstore and avoid the risk of the book showing up late. 

Rent Your Textbooks for Cheap Prices

A lot of colleges have arranged a rental system for textbooks. Instead of buying a book to keep, students rent the book and then return it at the end of the semester. Rental prices are generally significantly lower than purchase prices. If you won’t need a textbook for a whole semester, this is a really good route to take because you can often choose the number of days that you want to rent the textbook.

When looking at this option, you must consider the amount of money you’re likely to get back for the textbook. For example, if  the price to buy is $50, the price you think you’ll get back is $30 and the cost to rent is $15, then it makes much more sense to rent than to buy. However if the cost to rent were $25, then you would save more money by simply buying the book and selling it back.

Save Money on Textbooks with eBooks

Another option to consider is getting digital versions of textbooks on iPad or Kindle. I group it under renting because, like rental textbooks, digital textbooks you can’t sell back. These are usually quite a bit cheaper than typical printed textbooks, but not as widely available. Going digital will significantly decrease the burden on your back. Unfortunately, if you like bonding time with books, there is a complaint that digital books are more difficult to mark up. If you like to have a lot of one-on-one contact with books, digital may not be the option for you. 

There are a lot of options for decreasing your textbook expenses. It is up to you to decide which one will work best for you. Have you ever figured out a way to save money textbooks?

Stephen Sharpe has worked for almost a year for MyCollegesandCareers.com. There are few databases as extensive as My Colleges and Careers. MCC offers a directory of top jobs that may include your future career.

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