Getting Your Textbooks for Free
Monday, August 6, 2007 by Chris Lesinski Now that the title caught your attention: the truth is, you won’t get all of your textbooks for free, but you can probably get a few without paying for them. There’s a difference – you’ll see.
I’ve been trudging through the textbook debacle for several semesters, and like the student-cheapskate I am, I have some very creative solutions. I’ll also share a few more money-saving secrets for when there’s no choice but to drop the dollars. In other words, I’m not going to refer you to a bunch of websites that sell cheap textbooks and call it a post. This monster-sized article will turn you into a true textbook skinflint.
The Ultimate Free Textbook Reserve
Every school has a vast resource that furnishes students with free books. I’ve gone through whole semesters without paying for a single book, relying solely on this stockpile, but it’ll depend on your school’s program. Okay, here it is (you’re going to hate me): the library. Honestly, if you learn how to use the library – which you should anyway – then you’ll get through many classes without spending a cent.
The Weakest “Link”
Almost every library these days has some sort of book sharing network. They’re normally identified by some clever a portmanteau using “search” or “link” (i.e., “Link+” or “SearchOhio”). Ask about your school’s program. These services utilize other local libraries to expand your reach to just about any book you can dig up at Borders, amazon.com or even – your school’s bookstore.
You should never buy another novel as long as you’re in college. They’re all available in your library’s network. Soren Kierkegaard? Choose from eight different translations. But not just novels or philosophical transcripts – many, many textbooks are also available. Libraries frequently get textbook donations, and they’re not going to burn them just so the bookstore can rip-off more students.
But how do you keep it for the whole semester? A teacher tipped me off on this one freshman year: rotate different copies of the same book. When the copy you have is coming up for its last renewal, order another one through the same book network (or, a different one, depending on your school’s policies). As long as two or more libraries have a copy of the same book, you can continue rotating between the two until the semester’s through.
Selecting from the Selection of Selections
Next time you see A Communist Anthology of Native American Poetry or The Children’s Compendium of Short Stories About Pregnancy on your required texts for a class, don’t buy them. Selections, collections and compilations are filled with articles and narratives that are being re-published. Be fastidious: (expensive) books like Freakonomics and The World is Flat are mostly made up of previously published material also. You can find such material online: your school probably has a subscription to EBESCOhost, ProQuest, LEXIS-NEXIS and plenty of other databases (including ones that cover obscure texts like literary criticism and screenplays) – but you can even try a google search or a bugmenot.com login with the original publisher’s website.
Or, you can try less-expansive compilations and go through the semester in a piecemeal fashion. For instance, if your Short Fiction class has a two-week stretch on Edgar Allen Poe, check out one of the 257 Poe digests in your library and it’ll probably hit all of the sick stories your class requires. Use a copy machine if you need to make notes on the pages or if you’ll need to reference the story again for a paper/final.
If all else fails, hit up the research/reference desk where your school probably employs a lackey whose sole responsibility is to find material for you.
Beware
Your new book strategy might end up costing money if you’re not careful. Inter-collegiate book sharing networks usually charge hefty fines for overdue books. Luckily, you can renew most of them online (or convince the student-worker to back-log them for you). Loosing a borrowed book can also cost you a fortune. Also, be aware that many schools’ library rules can get difficult. For instance, at my local library, I can’t check out a book through another network if there’s a copy some where in the county library network – even if they’re all checked out with a line-up of 90 holds. That’s not the case at my college.
Look out for old editions of the same book. Publishers make miniscule changes in a book so that they can release a new edition and make more money. Your library probably doesn’t have the most recent edition of your Conjuring 101 textbook. That’s okay, though. I’ve gotten through 8th edition classes with a 2nd edition text before (with an A). The changes are often subtle: page numbers are shifted by a longer introduction, chapters are switched around for a more fluid curriculum, etc. The best way to wade through an old edition is by looking through the table of contents and finding the old version of the new topic. In fact, some teachers will furnish you with an older syllabus that corresponds with your book – they hate the new editions just as much as you do because it means revamping their class’s program.
Textbook Gambling
Textbook gambling is the real deal. It takes balls, but it rarely fails. The bottom line: you will vastly reduce your all-around textbook-spending if you only buy what you need. You don’t need all the textbooks listed on your school’s computer system – or even all the books in the syllabus.
I’ve never bought my books until at least two weeks into a class, for two reasons: I’m never sure which class I might drop and I’m never sure which books the teacher might drop. When it gets to crunch time towards a semester's end, sometimes teachers dump the last novel (or, the last few). Often, the school requires a certain book for College English, but your particular teacher doesn’t use it at all. In other classes, the lectures cover all of the reading material and the textbook is just redundant. There are only a few ways to know for sure: ask the professor, ask a friend who took the class or just wait it out.
Textbook gambling can be nerve-wracking: at any time, the teacher might deploy a surprise reading assignment, assuming that everyone already owns the book. It’ll take a website at least a few days to ship your book. What to do? Instructors are often generous enough to make copies of the first few assignments. (I even had a professor who let me borrow his extra teacher-edition.) Try the library (above) or one of the several penny-pinching techniques below to get you through until your delivery arrives.
Other Tools of the Textbook Penny-Pincher
The Net
Indeed, many people scorn the publishers’ needless manipulation of the textbook market. Helping the cause are a few organizations that provide textbooks in their entirety online, completely free of charge. Though they only stock less than a few hundred books apiece, it’s worth it to browse their catalog just in case. The two parties on the block are Freeload Press and Textbook Revolution
The Bookstore
Don’t ever buy a book from the book store. The way I see it, no class assignment is worth getting that ripped-off. But you can still exploit these awful conglomerates while you’re waiting for a book to ship. Sometimes, it’s easy enough to read a small assignment right there in the store. Some stores might be plush enough to get through the whole semester in that fashion. Early in the semester, bookstores have a longer return policy. Buy a book for as long as they’ll let you, then return it when you obtain your permanent copy.
Most bookstores have wised up to our cleverness. Some books come shrink-wrapped like a Playboy magazine. I’ve even been threatened by bookstore kingpins: “We don’t accept returns if there are any signs of having been read.” So most of the time, dealing with such evils are a last resort.
Half.com
You can spend a lot of time trying to find the cheapest used book online. I advise that you keep it to a minimum. In the end, there’s no real way of knowing exactly what condition the book will be in, so a five to 10 dollar difference in price is negligible when you consider how much it’ll re-sell for. When I do have to buy a book, my one-stop-shop is half.com. It’s a big market that drives prices way down and it works directly with your eBay feedback, creating a little synergy. Most of the sellers are students just like you, and sometimes, it’s a kid right down the hall.
Peers
Perhaps a friend who’s already taken the class will sell you the book directly. Sharing a book with someone else in the class is a huge saver. In fact, sometimes, “Can I borrow your textbook?” can double as a sexual overture.
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That is why I created www.StudentBookTrades.com. An easy way to find college textbooks that other students have already completed courses for. Students are automatically matched with each other to trade textbooks for classes they have completed. Trade, Swap, sell, or buy college textbooks from other students. Search the book database, contact the student at your home campus, city, state, or nationwide about the book and save money.
save to my Bookmarks )
the bookstore wanted $217.50 for one of the textbooks i need. i got it online (brand new) from abebooks.com for $85.97 after a coupon and shipping! screw the campus bookstore. if you want to save money, there's almost always a way!
You guys missed the most obvious, cheap and reliable solution of all: TORRENTS.
Not only can you sometimes get .pdf files of the newest edition. For a major text you will be able to find one or two editions out of date 99% of the time.
You can also get solutions manuals too :D
An elaboration on your "regional editions" tip, based on my experience:
Always buy international editions from Singaporean/Thai/Taiwanese/etc stores you find on Google Checkout. (They're not legal to sell in the US, but are legal to buy, as far as I know). I've saved literally hundreds of dollars every semester doing this.
You'll get a book that 1) costs 60%+ less than retail; 2) is brand-new and no-frills 3) has the same exact content as the official US copy.
Ask for the "risks" ... well, honestly, I have never been disappointed by overseas shippers; they are prompt, courteous, and shipping is always reasonable, so don't worry about that. Also, I've never once been swindled (after buying books from such parties about 5-7 times now).
Trust me, it feels awesome to give the school book store a big "up yours" by buying cheap international books. ;)
Another good resource (mostly for novels) is www.paperbackswap.com. Send some a paperback (about $2 for shipping) and then you get a credit to request a book from someone for free. I've tried it out and it works quite nicely.
Link to above: www.paperbackswap.com
You could also try textbook rentals from sites like Chegg.com.
Really. You all ought to be more creative. I used to MAKE MONEY on my text books. I bought used from friends who were taking the class I was going to take. When I was done, I sold them to students taking the class the next semester. I just showed up to the class a few minutes before it started on the first day and announced I had a book for sale and they could save a lot of money over buying it at the bookstore. Cashed in. I have to admit, that was quite a few years ago and new editions come out more frequently now, making such a plan more difficult. But not impossible.
I buy my books online from websites for as cheap as I can buy them (older editions, like mentioned above, and even instructor editions - lots of info in those as well as cheaper) and then sell them back for a little more (including the shipping I paid) to other students who have to take the class the next semester. Therefore, I'll make a little profit off them. Better than free because I'm putting more money back into my pocket.
I "textbook gamble" some and also trade or borrow books with friends.
a simple chronological money saver:
1. find out what the last day for full price buy back is at the bookstore
2. rent as many of the textbooks as you can from the library or friends
3. wait until the first day of classes, get the list of what pages / sections in the book you'll actually need.
4. scan these into your computer using the OCR (optical character reader) of the scanner. or just as a pdf will work too
5. return the book to wherever you got it from.
you now have a copy of everything in the book that you'll need, right there on your computer. you can highlight it, cut it, paste it, print it, or anything else.
* if you do this, please upload it to a torrent site with the title of the book, the edition, the author, and the ISBN (cause sometimes it's easier to search that way)
Only reason I've bothered to get my books in the school bookstore is because my financial aid money doesn't get distributed for another 3 weeks and we need the books before then. But I only bought the ones I really needed a new copy for. Unfortunately, my school made the whole system switch to new books so there is a huge lack of used versions in the bookstore and the copies people didn't sell back aren't being used, except psychology.
Bookase.com will enable you to compare the prices of books and textbooks all over the world in order to determine which online retailer is the most convenient one for you. It offers various option on shippng methods. So that you can choose which option suits you the best. It also provides discount coupons to furhter reduce on the cost of the books. This site aims at replacing traditional bookstores with a price comparison engine for the major online bookstores worldwide connecting both buyers and sellers directly
I am not sure if I want to give away this tip, but I have had a TON of success with this trick. What I do is contact the publisher/textbook representative for the college, school, university (whatever) and tell them that I am a professor (adjunct, of course) and need a few sample textbooks. I usually ask for several; that way they won't be suspicious. I then have the textbooks delivered to my home address, because I tell them that I don't have an official mailbox at the University Drop names (like the dean, the other textbook rep, other textbook companies, etc...) and talk the talk.
Here's the extra bonus...I take the extra books they send me and I sell them on ebay. Sometimes the books are coded so that you cannot sell them on ebay, but I usually get around that easily.
Happy scamming!!
<A HREF="http://www.dealoz.com/929/index.htm">DealOz</A> searches the cheapest books. Amazon can be beat.
I use Bookase.com Compare Textbook Prices to buy books and sell my used books. It gives me the price comparison of the books showing me the lowest price for which i can buy the book for from various online bookstores in one go. Also it shows the highest prices offered to by various stores to buyback my used books. It is an excellent service
After reading this, I got all my textbooks for spring semester from my college library...which lets one check out books for an entire semester! I got a couple older editions, and saved myself 25 dollars using Google Books
Interesting list. Just to point out - textbooks cost a lot partly because the publishers want to make a buck (ok - a lot of bucks). Part of the cost is to cover the actual costs of publishing it. All those pictures? Gotta pay to use each one, even the generic clipart. Drawings? Gotta pay an illustrator. Quotes from other work? Gotta pay to use that, too.
Some of these costs depend on how many copies get sold, some just depend on the size of the book. And if the publisher doesn't get enough money to cover the costs of publishing the thing... then they'll eventually close up shop. Fewer publishers = fewer books available for your profs to choose from, and less competition can mean higher prices.
Think of it this way... if the publisher only gets paid for 25% of the copies used - because of clever tricks like those given here - then the one copy that does get sold needs to cost 4x as much to bring in the same money. You're not just sticking it to "the man" who wants $217 for a textbook. You're also sticking it to your classmates who sucked it up and acted honestly.
I see a digital textbook future, I am sure of it. Nice Post!
I wish i would have read this over the summer as I was buying books for the fall semester! I bought most of the books online in past editions and Humanities novels (Frankenstein and the likes). I don't sell well on Ebay, and when i tried to return my books to the bookstore (my plan was to buy online and sell back at the bookstore for more profit), i only got about $7 out of $75. A complete waste of cash. well, i was smarter this semester and I plan on getting more cash...
thanks for the tips! i'm bookmarking this page!