Textbooks For College
10 Top Tips to Save you Money on your Textbooks for College
If you’re a college student starting a new academic year, you’re likely reeling in shock from the amount of money you’re being asked to spend on textbooks for college.
The price of those textbooks can be astounding – and they’re always rising. The U.S. Government Accountability Office confirmed that college text book prices exploded at twice the inflation rate in the 18 years between 1986 and 2004.
Are there any ways to counter this huge expense? Well yes actually, there are quite are few. The following list of 10 tips will give you some hints for saving on your college text books this semester.
1. Your on-campus bookshop is usually the fastest and easiest way to find the textbooks you need for college, however, it is often also the most expensive. Despite this you might be able to make some small savings by getting to the store as soon as you get your required textbook list so that you can grab any used copies, after all it follows that most textbooks you need will have been used by some the previous students doing your course.
2. You should also take advantage of the campus bookstore by noting down the ISBN numbers for the textbooks you need – (The ISBN no. is a unique identifier for every book in print) and the price of a new and, if available, a used copy. You can then use this info to comparison shop either in another bookstore or online at places such as Amazon.com
.
3. Embrace new ways to read and study. As well as hard copy college text books, there are now many textbooks for college available on as audio books, in digital form to be read online or as downloadable ebooks, many of which will also allow you to notate and save as your are studying. You can also buy just single chapters in ebook from from sites such as ichapters.com
4. Check out CourseSmart online. 5 prominent college text book publishers – have set up a joint venture to publish thousands of textbooks in eBook format via CourseSmart.com. The site is continually evolving and adding new college text books to it’s available list and is definitely worth checking out.
5. You can now also rent the textbooks you need for college. In a system similar to NetFlix where you rent movies online, there are a number of online companies that offer the same service for your textbooks. You can make great savings this way, as long as you are diligent about returning the books on time. Any overdue fees will outweigh the savings you made renting instead of buying. You could also check to see if your college or uni itself offers a text book rental service.
6. Take advantage of free downloads. Mainly for literary classics but also available for some other helpful text books, take advantage of these as you find them.
7. Find other like minded students and form a textbook sharing co-operative in your college – you shouldn’t find any shortage of willing participants and if you can find others that are following the same course as you, the opportunities for sharing, exchanging and buying & selling textbooks at a fair price will save you a fortune.
8. Some may say it’s old fashioned but don’t forget the library, either on campus or in town. Most college libraries will have copies of your required reading textbooks but usually only in very limited quantities so unless you are in early, you may miss out. The town or council library will be a bit more of a hit and miss affair when it comes to textbooks for college but it’s definitely worth a shot.
9. Don’t necessarily rush out and buy the latest release or updated version of a college text book. It may be that the revisions are relatively few and/or minor. If possible, compare both versions before you buy to check for differences and if they are only small it may well be a better investment to buy the older edition as they are usually heavily discounted once a new release has come out.
10. When the time comes to sell your text books, remember the situation you were in at the beginning of the semester. You will not get a good return from the campus bookstore if you choose to sell them back. If there is a book co-operative, you could sell them through this. There are also a number of online sites that will buy your college text books or you could sell them yourself through eBay or Amazon.
Keep an eye out for future posts and pages as we explore each of these textbooks for college options more closely.
