111 Tips To Help You Get The Cheapest Used College Textbooks.

FIND CHEAPEST USED COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS

1. How Do You Know Exactly What Textbooks You Will Need For Your Classes?

You are tired of buying new textbooks at the bookstore. This semester, you will buy used textbooks online.

Just one problem.

No clue which book you will need exactly.

There are tons of Psychology, Biology, Chemistry, and Economics. Which is the right one?

Run to your bookstore 2 weeks before your class start. Most professors have already assigned textbooks for the courses.

Make sure you know which book is Recommended and which is Required. You will need the Required ones anyway.

Get the ISBN number and start searching online.

2 weeks is generally enough time for the book to arrive.  You will get your textbooks on time and won’t fall behind in class.

Plus you will save more money than the guy sit next to you with his shiny new textbook. Sure, it’s shiny now but its value will drop so fast that when it’s time for the bookstore to buy back that book, he doesn’t even have time to say: But..but…it’s like new…!!?

2. Should Your Professor Know The Price Of Your Textbook Before He Put It In Your Syllabus?

Have you ever wonder about this?

On the first day of classes, you get your syllabus.  Your professor puts a book on it.

Do you think he SHOULD know how much that book costs?

More importantly, does he even care?

Doubt it.

Generally, your professor will order a general book for your course.  All he (or she) says is you can buy it at the bookstore.

Period.

He has no idea how much it costs.

You have no clue how much you have to pay.

See the problem?

Your professor already put the order for the books in the bookstore. He didn’t check the price before he did that.

Everything is said and done.

What can you do?

Go to the bookstore, bend over your head to pay for your textbook, don’t touch it for the rest of the course, and then resell it back to the bookstore for pennies on the dollar.

Do you think your professor should know the price of your textbook before he places an order at the bookstore?

Yes.

He should (if he cares about his students even a tiny bit).

Why?

Because if he does, he can find other cheaper resources.

If he doesn’t really use it in the course, then he shouldn’t put it in the syllabus at all.

You are in college. You are already broke. It’s not fair for your professor to make you buy something that he knows that you don’t need.

3. Is The Study Guide More Helpful Than The Main Textbook?

Have you ever take a look at the study guide of your main textbook?

No?

Well, you may be missing out on a big saving.

Study guide is like a summary of your main textbook. It just tells you important content. Sometimes it has quizzes or tests to test your knowledge.

It’s very helpful. So helpful that it can replace the main book.

For general Economics class, study guide is easier to understand than the main book. It just tells you what you need to know.

If you are taking this kind of classes to satisfy a requirement, then check out the study for your books first to see if you rather buy the study guide instead of the main textbook.

Buying the main textbook online is cheap. But if you only want to buy the study guide on popular online bookstores like Half.com or Amazon, it will be much cheaper.

4. Where Is The Best Place To Find Cheap English Books?

If you need cheap History or English textbooks but can’t find cheap deals anywhere else, try Overstock.com.

Heard of Overstock.com before?

Basically, it’s just an online store that buy excesses from manufacturers and then resell them at a lower price.

It has large selection of reading books for you to choose, especially English book.

Overstock.com often have promotions on shipping.

Right now, they have 2.95$ flat rate shipping on your entire order.

But 2 things you need to know:

* Only for shipping within US 48 states, not including Alaska and Hawaii

* If you buy only books, you might not get 2.95$ shipping

So if you can’t find your books anywhere else, see if Overstock has it.

5. Did You Know This 1 Little Known Place You Can Get Your Cheap College Textbooks?

You might be surprised.

But did you know you may be able to find cheap college textbooks on Craiglist.com ?

You have heard of Craiglist.com, have you?

No?

Well, it’s just an online classified ads site. You can post your ads for free.

This site is quite popular now. People use it to advertise for everything imaginable.

Craiglist is divided into different regions so try to deal with sellers within your region. It’s possible that sellers are college students from universities near you.

One problem is that not many students use this platform to sell and buy used textbooks yet. So it may take you awhile to find your textbook. But if you want to find the cheapest deal, you want to try this. May be you will be lucky.

If you want to sell your textbooks, you can post an ad as well. You can afford it because it’s free.

There are some other awesome stuffs on Craiglist as well . But in the mean time, try to focus on getting your cheap textbooks. Ok?

6. Can Your Professor Help You Save On Your Textbooks?

The answer is definitely Yes.

But your professor may have to spend a little bit of time… to craft out your textbook.

What does it mean?

Bulk pack.

Bulk pack contains selected materials from many different books that your professor intends to teach in the course.

It’s much more helpful than a traditional textbook. In some courses, 80% of the textbook is irrelevant to the course.

So what’s the use of that heavy textbook when the teacher don’t even use it?

If the professor is the expert in his or her own field, it should be an easy task to pick out articles to make a bulk pack for the course.

Bulk pack is often cheaper than traditional textbook because it is printed in black and white.

It is also much more helpful when you need to review the materials for your tests or finals because it’s similar to your professor’s teaching plan.

With a bulk pack, you can rip off relevant article to read in your free time. No more dragging the heavy textbook around campus.

One disadvantage of the bulk-pack is that you can’t resell it. However, in some courses, you can’t resell your books anyway because those books are specific to your campus.

Ask your professor if a bulk pack for his or her course is available.

7. Did You Try This Method To Buy Your Textbooks Straight From Your College Mates?

So you know a class you will take next semester. You ask the professor which textbook he will use. You’re confident that he will use the same one as he did this semester.

You don’t want to find deals online. You don’t want to spend too much time on the computer.

But you also don’t want to get ripped off by your bookstore.

What now?

Go to your computer. Type this announcement:

Need X textbooks from Course Y

If you want to sell it to me, contact  phone: xxx-xx-xxx

Or Email: XXX@XX.com

Willing to pay: X dollars

Needed by: X date

Now you just replace the XX with your information.

Keep in mind, set a reasonable price you are willing to pay. Just don’t say you will pay 10$ for a book that cost 160$. Be reasonable.

Post it on the door of that classroom.  Someone also wants to get rid of his books ASAP. It’s likely that someone will respond.

There is also another way but it involves the professor.

Tell the professor you want to buy a book from one of his or her students. Would he or she kindly pass on your contact information in case if a student is interested to sell his copy.

This can work. Just not sure if you would like to bother the professors. They may refuse to help.

But if they do, you can always post an announcement on the door. Simple and non-invasive.

8. Ask Your Professor: Do You Really Need The Textbook?

Have you ever bought a textbook and you never ever opened it during the course?

A textbook was on the syllabus. But the professor used PowerPoint. He taught his own materials (a collection from his own books).

Got me thinking. Why did I buy the book in the first place?

Have you ever experienced this?

It seems like professors are obligated to put a textbook on the syllabus. Any textbook will do. It doesn’t matter if they don’t use it.

What do we do now?

Ask your professor.

How much of their materials will come from the books? What percentage of the exam will be materials in the books? (Several will put this on the syllabus. Others don’t).

Bluntly, what you want to know is: Do you really, I mean really, need the textbooks?

But don’t ask them like that. It’s like one of those forbidden question: Do I really need to go to class?

You don’t want to offend your professors on the first day of classes. You might need their recommendations later.

So phrasing your questions nicely.

If you get a clear answer that most of the materials will be on the lectures. Then you probably don’t need the book.

Why buy it if you don’t need it? How do you know you don’t need it if you don’t ask?

Ask. Ask. Ask.

Just don’t offend your professors.

9. What To Do When You Can’t Get Your Textbooks Information From Your Professors?

So it was 2 more weeks until the first date of classes. You wanted to be prepared. You wanted to know which textbooks you needed so you could buy them early and cheap.

You emailed your professors.

…

No response.

…

Still no response.

…

Ah! Finally a response. Wait for your syllabus.

Well, at least your professor was honest.

He wanted you to wait for the official syllabus so you can get the right books.

There are 2 kind of textbooks for each courses:

• Required
• Recommended

Usually, you don’t need the recommended books unless you are really interested in the subject.

So professor can make a mistake by emailing the students the Recommended Books instead of the Required ones. Or worse, they gave you the wrong information. So you’ve wasted time and money for the wrong books.

What can you do?

• You can go to the bookstore and check the textbooks.
• You can wait for the syllabus.

Most often, the bookstore already have the textbooks information 1-2 weeks before classes.

But if you can’t find your textbook information there, all you can do is to wait for the syllabus.

A few professors are quite indecisive (if not a bit sloppy), they may change the textbooks at the last minute.

So you don’t want to waste money and time hunting for the wrong books, don’t you?

A sound advice: wait for the official syllabus. Even the sloppiest professors have to put the right information on the official syllabus, don’t they?

Don’t worry, you can still get cheap textbooks then.

10. Do You Know What’s 1 Common Problem When You Try To Get The ISBN Numbers At Your College Bookstore?

So you need the ISBN numbers for your books, you go to the bookstore to get them. Just one problem, the bookstore clerk didn’t let you do it.

He (or she, doesn’t matter) was friendly. He asked you what book you need. He walked you to the exact location. Then he finally helped out check out too.

Ahhh! How helpful! This guy deserves a raise.

But, you didn’t get the ISBN numbers for your books.

Ok. Focus now.

The bookstore doesn’t want you to get the ISBN number. It will lose your business.

So what does it do? Send out clerks that make sure you take that big book (that costs more than your food budget) to the counter and check out.

Well, you can’t afford to do that.

So how are you going to get around it?

2 ways.

1. Go when the bookstore is busiest

The busiest time depends on each bookstore. If you come in and see a long line of students waiting to check out, that’s the busiest.

Normally, it’s usually around 10-12 am or 3-5 pm. But pay a bit attention when you pass your bookstore. It’s not hard to figure out.

If there are tons of students, the clerk won’t be able to pay attention you. You can get all of the ISBN numbers you want.

2. Take the book and go to another place

If you can’t get away from the clerk, just take your textbooks and go to the Travel section.

Jot down the ISBN number and leave them on the table to return them to their original location.

SOooooo , how do you feel? Are you ready to get that ISBN number?

11. What To Do When Your Bookstore Hides The ISBN Number From You?

The fastest way to hunt for the right used textbooks is to use the ISBN number. But when you go to your bookstore, you find out that the bookstore covers the ISBN number.

How the bookstore hides the ISBN number?

1. Put a sticker over the ISBN number
2. Put a study guide or CD cover behind the main textbooks
3. Wrap the book in a way that there’s no way you can see the ISBN number

Unless you have X-ray vision, you’re not going to get that precious ISBN number.

So what to do now?

Fear not. There are other ways.

Now although ISBN number is the fastest way to find your books. You can still find them using Title, Author, and Edition. It might take a bit longer but it can work.

But if you are afraid that you might get the wrong textbook, here’s another way to get them.

College bookstores often allow students to return the books after a certain date if you don’t need them anymore. Why? Because students do drop and add classes within the first 2 weeks of the semester.

Take advantage of this.

Buy the books. Get the ISBN number. Use ISBN number to hunt cheap textbooks online. Return the books before the deadline date.

However, some stores have certain policy for returning like:

• Evidence that you drop the classes
• Can’t return if the wrap comes off
• Different date for English course books

So check your bookstore’s policy carefully and go get the ISBN numbers.

12. Do You Know Why You Shouldn’t Be Afraid of International Edition Textbooks?

Searching for your college textbooks online, you see the cheapest price. But you’re hesitant to buy because it says International Edition. You’re afraid it’s different from the US Edition?

Do you know what’s International Edition mean?

Simple. Publishers published US Edition to sell in US and Canada. On the other hand, International Edition are sold in other countries depending on their currency value and economic status.

For short, it’s the edition to sell internationally.

International Edition textbooks are cheaper than US Edition version.

Why?

Many buyers think International Edition means it’s produced by foreign publishers.  Yes, the label is a bit confused. Thus, many buyers often pass off a good deal on International Edition textbook to hunt for the US versions.

They don’t know what you know now.  The 2 types of Edition is the same. They are just sold in different market.

So next time hunting for used college textbooks, don’t skip a listing because it says International Edition. You just may have found a good bargain.

13. Do You Know These 5 Simple Secrets To Get The Cheapest Used College Textbooks?

1. Go To The Right Place

One place you can find the best deals on used college textbooks is: Half.com. There are a few other places but we will go over one by one because we want to give you more options to  maximize your savings.

However, before you can buy from Half.com, you have to create an account. It’s free and easy to complete. If you want to know what kind of information you will be asked, click here to take a look.  Notice that you are creating an account at Ebay and not Half.com.  Don’t worry, once you have an account at Ebay, you can access all of its sister sites including Half.com.

Keep in mind to provide your primary email address.  Sellers will contact you via that email concerning your orders.

2. Hunt For That Right Book

It’s wonderful that you have saved 50$ on a book that would otherwise cost 150$ at the bookstore (tap on the back).  But then, it struck you that you have just bought the wrong book for the course (slap in the face).  It sucks, doesn’t it? You don’t want that.

How do you often search for a book? By title? By author? By edition? Well, this is how 99%  of the college students search for their textbooks.  The search is long and exhausted. Sometimes, you even end up getting the wrong book.

One little tip that help you spot the right textbook with minimal effort and time is the (drum roll please): ISBN number.

ISBN is abbreviated for National Standard Book Number (but you don’t need to jot this down, just a fun fact).

Not many students notice this number but 1% who do can find their college textbooks online in the speed of light. Now you know about the number, you are in that 1%. Well, almost.

Grab any book you can and turn to the back. Move your eyes to the lower right corner. See the bar code? Look right below it (or above it). Notice the ISBN number? Yes?  That’s the number that will save you time AND money.

ISBN number contains 10 digits. It often starts with a zero or an X. It is either above or below the bar code.

If you know which books to buy for your next semester, jot down all of the ISBN numbers. If you can’t find the ISBN numbers on your syllabus or online, head to your bookstore with a notepad and start writing down numbers now.

3. Search For Best Price

Hopefully, you have done 2 simple tasks:

• Create an account at Half.com
• Have all of the ISBN numbers for your books

If you didn’t, you can do them now before we move on.

Sign in your account and start searching.

Start with one book at a time. Type in the ISBN number of your first book. See that your book will be available in 5 conditions:

• Brand new
• Like new
• Very good
• Good
• Acceptable

The price will match with the conditions.  Keep in mind that the conditions assigned are subjective.  A book may look acceptable to you but the seller may see it as very good.  So unless you want your book to win first prize at your local county fair, good OR acceptable books are sufficient. Also, these books are much cheaper than like new or brand new books.

Find the cheapest used college textbooks you want yet? Wait, don’t click the BUY button yet. If you want your transaction go as smoothly as possible, read these 3 things:

• Seller feedback
• Comments on the products
• Shipping locations

For seller feedback, the percentage is the positive ratings from past customers. The ideal percentage is 99-100%. That means 99% – 100% past customers are happy with the products AND the seller. You want to be one of those happy customers.

Most sellers give general descriptions of the book like excellent binder, minimal writings, standard shipping, etc… Browse through the comment to see which book you want.

Lastly, choose the shipping location near you so you will get your textbook faster. You have two options for shipping: media and express. You will have to pay more for the express (like everything express, right?)

4. To Buy

By now, you have done:

• Create an account at Half.com
• ISBN number
• Found a used college text books you want

Now, you are ready to buy.

When you click on the BUY button, you will Proceed To Check Out. You need to provide 2 things:

• Name and Address the book will ship to (check it twice to make sure it’s correct)
• Your credit card information to pay for your book

Finally,  click Place the order.

Within 24 hours, check for a confirmation email for your order.  Within 3 days, you will receive an email notify that your book is shipped.

Now you wait. There are a few problems that may come up and I will address them in another post. For now, your part is finished. Well done. You have just saved a lot of money on good used college textbooks.

5. Receive, smile, leave feedback

The mail came. Your books arrived. Ah, the fruit of your labor.

So now you got your used college textbooks with the biggest smile on your face because you have just saved 400$ ( yes, you can save that much money) for anything that you weren’t able to enjoy last semester. You got to be happy with that.

But wait, before you run off, there is one last thing that need your attention. You need to leave a feedback for each of your transactions. Why? Because you need to leave feedback in order to receive feedback.

Why again? Because you need feedback to increase your sales if you want to sell back your used college textbooks. That’s right!   You will not only learn how to save, but how to resell, and also how to earn extra cash with your used college textbooks.

That’s why leaving feedback is so important. Make sure you set aside a few minutes to complete them.  You won’t regret it.

Do these 5 simple steps:

• Sign in your Half.com account
• In My Account – click My Feedback
• Click Leave Feedback
• Rate positive, negative, or neutral ( hopefully positive)
• Leave a few words for sellers, products, and shipping speed, etc…

Now you’re done. Check back to see what the seller has to say about you. If you paid fast, you will 99.999% have a positive feedback from your seller.

Starting a new semester with a big smile knowing that you got the same used college textbooks as your classmates – only with half the cost. Shhh…

BUY CHEAPEST USED COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS.

14. Why Buying Your Textbooks Online Will Help You And Your Kids In The Future?

You love the convenience of your bookstore. It’s only 3 minutes away from your dorm.

But you hate the textbooks’ price because it sometimes make you want to do away with all of the textbooks once and for all.

However, you need the textbooks for test review and problem solving. So you buy your books online.

You don’t know this but buying your textbooks online actually help you and your kids in the future.

Why?

If more students buy their books online, the bookstores and the publishers are forced to lower their price.

So in the long run, the bookstores’ prices may have to match the online price if the bookstores want to stay in business.

If that does happen, then you can enjoy the convenience of shopping at your local bookstore at the online bargain deals.

If you have kids in college and assume that they still need textbooks, they can shop at their bookstore and you won’t be served with a shocking bill. Less stress.

So tell all of your friends to shop their books online.

If they don’t know how to do that, show them.

If you have no idea (or time) to put it into words, send them an email with a link to this site. There are plenty of tips here to get them start. Your friend will thank you for it when they save hundreds of dollars next semester on college textbooks.

15. Do You know 2 Ways Publishers Make You Pay Much More For Your College Textbooks?

Ever wonder why your textbooks’ cost keep rising at an alarming rate?

Well, publishers have 2 ways to increase your textbooks’ price. They are super effective, especially when you believe that they are for your benefits.

1. New Edition

Every 3 year or so, new edition of your textbooks is published. There is probably no major updates except the pages are numbered differently.

This really screws you up since the syllabus always follow the new edition. You have no choice BUT buying the new edition.

The new edition is often 70% more expensive than the older edition.

Publishers achieve 2 things when printing out the new edition:

1. Charge more for the new edition
2. Stop you from buying and selling old edition by removing your need of the old edition

2 birds with one stone. So effective.

Sure, there is new edition with major updates. But most of the time, you don’t even realize that you are using the new edition.

2. Bundles

Have you ever noticed many extra things that come with your book? Study guide, solution guide, CD package, and Online Interactive Registration, etc…

Have no idea why you need so may darn things but you don’t even use them? Even the professors don’t even mention them in class.

And yet, publishers include them and raise the price 3-4 folds.

Bundled textbooks make you believe that you’re saving money but you don’t. How can you save money when you are paying for something you don’t need? (even it costs only 10$)

See how effective these methods are in forcing you to pay more for your textbooks? Avoid it by shopping online. You’ll be glad you did.

16. Is It Worth To Use The Old Edition College Textbooks Instead Of The New Edition?

If you are in college or have been in college, you know about the textbooks costs. If you are about to go to college, don’t be shocked if your textbooks cost more than your food budget.

You are not scared of the professors. You’re scared of the textbook’s bill.

You go shopping for your textbooks in the store. You go online.

The new edition is too expensive, you figure you can survive with an older edition. Also it’s much cheaper.

Yes.

And no.

It depends on the course.

New edition of a college textbook is published every 3 years or so. Some are slightly updated. Others changes completely.

Using the old edition means you have to do more work.

If your professor uses the new edition, your syllabus will follow the new edition. That means different page content and different homework problems.

If you don’t mind searching for the right content on your edition, then buy the old edition to save some money.

If  you don’t think it’s worth your time going back and forth between the old and new edition, then you will just have to buy the new edition.

First, email the professor and ask him (or her) if it would be wise for you to use the older edition to save money. Most professors prefer the new edition.  Standardize all of the students. Less work.

But just ask anyway. See what they say.

One more thing, if your professor uses the book for reference only, an older edition copy may work.

17. What are the 4 Top Fears When Ordering Your Textbooks Online That Make You Run To Your Bookstore Despite The Ridiculous Price?

You always buy your textbooks at your bookstore. Why?

4 top fears.

Let’s address each of them.

1. Fear Of Paying To Much For Shipping

Nowadays, you pay a fixed charge for your shipping. For example, Half.com charges you 3.99$ for media shipping and 5.99$ for expedited shipping.

So for example, your textbook costs 180$ at your bookstore. You find a copy that costs only 50$ on Half.com. You pay 3.99$ for shipping. So totally, you pay 53.99$ to get your book online.

Since the sellers have to charge a fix price, you will never pay too much for shipping for hard-cover heavy books.

2. Fear Of Not Getting The Right Book

That’s why you need the ISBN number. ISBN number helps you pinpoint the right textbook.

3. Fear Of Delay Shipping

If you hate waiting for your books when your classes already starts, search and order it early. There is perfect time to buy books so you won’t fall behind in class.

4. Fear Of Not Getting The Book At All

This is why you love feedback system. Before you buy your textbooks on Half.com you can read the sellers’ feedback. Positive feedback = reliable sellers.

If 100 past customers all got their books in time, you can be confident that the book will be shipped to you.

If there is any problem, the seller will contact you right away. That’s a reliable seller’s responsibility.

No seller wants negative feedbacks. Bad reputation = no sell.

18. If You Can’t Find Your Cheap Textbooks At Half.com, Why Not Try Amazon.com?

When you want to buy your college textbooks, try Half.com. It has tons of books and sellers. You are likely to find your textbooks there.

If not, you can try another popular place: Amazon.com.

Have the ISBN number (turn the book around and look to your lower right, see it?)? Type it in. One at a time.

Then:

* Choose your books

* Choose your shipping method

* Punch in your payment information

* Wait for your books

2 shipping methods are charged as followed:

1. Media

* 4-14 days * 3.99$ for books (hard or paperback)

2. Expedited

* 4-6 days * 6.99$ for books (hard or paperback)

If you order your books from Amazon early, you don’t need expedited shipping. Most of the time, media shipping works just fine.

19. Is This Why You Don’t Want To Buy Your Textbooks Online?

You are in college. You have excess energy but limited money. You want to hold on to every dollar you get.

You don’t want to shop your textbooks online.

Why?

You don’t want to provide your personal and credit card information.

That’s a good reason. You should be aware who you gave your information to. Friend or Foe?

That’s why you want to buy your textbooks from major online bookstores like Half.com or Amazon.com

They have been on the net for a long time and have served millions of students like you.

They have feedback systems to keep the sellers in check. You then choose the seller you want to do business with.

If you buy books on Ebay.com, you can check out their forums. See how sellers and buyers interact. If there is a bad apple in the bunch, you are more likely to hear someone complaining about it in the forum.

If you want more protection, create an account at PayPal. PayPal can help avoid entering your bank information online. You will only send payment using your email address. No credit card. No bank account. No exposure.

20. See How Easily You Can Save 300$ On Used College Textbooks in one semester?

For example, if you take my courses, you will need 3 college textbooks:

Organic Chemistry by Leroy Wade:

Bookstore: 114$

Online: average 50$.

Biology by Jane Reece et al

Bookstore: 183$

Online: Good condition averaged 80$.

Microeconomics by Michael Parkin

Bookstore: 186$

Online: Good condition averaged 60$.

So if you buy from your bookstore, you easily spend 114 + 183 + 186 = 483$ in 5 minutes.

If you

• create an account at Half.com ( don’t have one yet, create one now).
• spend 20 minutes hunting
• you will only pay  50 + 80 +60 = 190$.

Spend 20 minutes, save 300$. See how easy it is.

I hunt for my cheapest used college textbooks every semester. Timing is important to get the best deals.

21. What are 4 Top Reasons You Are Still Shopping At Your Bookstore For Your College Textbooks?

Despite being charged ridiculous prices for your textbooks, you still buy your college textbooks at your bookstore. Why?

4 top reasons:

1. Convenience

Your bookstore is always near your campus. Its convenient location entices you to run straight there for all your textbooks’ needs. Despite long line and outrageous price tag, you still are a loyal customer. Bravo.

2. Laziness to find deals elsewhere

You have your syllabus. Your professor says you can find these books at the bookstore. You run like hell over there to purchase the books. You are too lazy to find cheaper copies elsewhere.

3. Fear of buying online

You have heard of your friends getting her books online for 50% of what you paid. But you have never tried. You fear that you will get the wrong book. So no online deals for you. You rather buy your textbooks at your bookstore and eat instant noodle for the rest of the semester.

4. Abundance of wealth

You are just too darn rich. You don’t care how much you spend on your textbooks. 1000$? No problem. Swipe. Done.

I can’t help you if your reason is #1, #2, or #4. Why?

#1: You prefer convenience over cost

#2: It’s your personality

#4: It’s the result of being wealthy. Nothing’s wrong with that. You just don’t need help saving money, that’s all.

22. Do You Know 1 Little Known Tip To Help You Grab The Cheap International Edition College Textbooks?

Publishers often produce 2 versions of the same textbook:

• US version
• International Edition

International Edition is sold in other countries depending on different currency values. Generally, the International Edition is cheaper than the US version. But the content is the same.

So where do you go to grab a cheap International Edition textbook ?

You can search on Half.com However,  not many International Edition textbooks are sold there.

A better place you can find cheap International Edition textbooks is Ebay

Not Ebay US but Ebay UK or Ebay AU. Lots of International Edition textbooks are up for auctions or available for instant purchase there.

Why? Because students over there use International Edition.

Normally, if you check out Half.com first, you can already find cheap US copies. But if not, check these places to find cheap International Edition.

But be careful of the shipping charge. If it costs too much to ship a book over sea, you will save more money by buying your books in the US.

23. Do You Experience these 9 Stresses When Buying Your College Textbooks At Your Bookstore?

No, not just the price. Every living soul who has ever been in college knows that.

It’s the line. The looooooooong line that you have to stand in for at least an hour if you buy your books at the bookstore.

Here’s a sum up of a typical experience when buying your books at the bookstore:

You find your books. Look at the price. Stress #1.

You have to carry them down to the check out stand. Almost fall down when standing on the escalator going down. Stress #2.

You begin to wait (patience is really the virtue here!). Stress #3.

Continue to wait..

…

Still waiting because someone forgets his study guide and the clerk has to get it for him. He turns his head, smiling and apologizing to all of the poor souls who are waiting in line. (Yes, your heart wants to forgive him but your head says: Damn it! Move quickly. The books are killing my arms here). Stress #4.

Finally, it’s your turn to check out. Look at the receipt again. Stress #5.

Think about dragging all of that textbooks home. The textbooks weigh more than you. Stress #6.

Find out that your professors don’t use them. They use their own material. Stress# 7.

Drag them back to the bookstore to resell them for 10% of their original price. Stress #8.

Repeat this mistake again next semester. Stress # 9.

Have no money. Overcharge for everything. Feel stupid after every purchase.

College is stressful enough. If buying your textbooks is this stressful, you don’t need a job when you get your degree. You need a therapy appointment.

24. Who Should You Blame For Making You Buy Expensive College Textbooks?

There are 3 characters in this story: you, your bookstore, and the publisher.

The problem: expensive textbooks

The story:

The publisher pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for authors, printing, and distributing textbooks. The author gets royalty whenever a new copy is sold.

Your bookstore has monopoly on your campus. Buying textbooks at the whole sale price. Marking them up 25-40%. Sell them to gullible students. Laughing all the way to the bank.

You go to the bookstore and buy your textbooks. You pay full price. Upsetting all the way back to the dorm.

You finish your classes. You resell your books back to the store. You get a few bucks. Continuing to stress all the way home.

Your bookstore take your used copy, re-wrap it, and sell it for 10 times what they paid you. Laughing all the way to the bank again.

The publisher and author gets nothing after the first sale. To fight this, they make bundled textbooks and revise the books every 3 year (every year if they have the energy). Add a picture here and there. Voila, there is a new edition for you. They have to raise the price to cover the loss in new-textbook sale.

Your bookstore orders the new edition because they know you have to buy them anyway. Marking them up even more. Laughing all the way to the bank for the third time.

So, who should you blame for the expensive college textbook?

A better question is: who get the highest and recurring profit in this scenario?

25. How Much Did Your Bookstore Pay For Your Textbooks?

Your bookstore will pay the whole-sale price for your textbooks. After all, a large class has 100-200 students. If you have 4 sections, that is 1000 students who need the same book. That is 1000-books order for the publisher. A big order.

So despite the outrageous price your bookstore charges you, how much do you think the publisher charges your bookstore per book?

I think it’s between 40-60% off the retail price. That’s a sweet deal.

The bookstores marks up the price and sell the books to the students. After every semester, they buy back used books and resell them again for next year’s class.

Then the bookstore will do that again and again until a new edition is published. Then they will stop buying back used copies and restock their shelves with new-edition books.

Profit. Profit. Profit.

P.R.O.F.I.T

This makes you wonder:

Why spending 4 hard years in college to get a job that only pay 30,000$ per year?

Just open a bookstore and monopolizes on a college campus and you will be a millionaire next semester!

26. Can Your Computer Replace Your College Textbooks?

So what do you think?

Can it?

I mean it can work, right?

For classes that require general knowledge, a computer is all you really need.

All of old information has been duplicated all over the place on the net. Why pay 160$ of a textbook when you can get the same information for free.

Sure, this method does not work well when you take classes specific to your major. But it can work for a few classes.

A few classes can add up to hundreds of dollars in saving. Who wouldn’t want that?

27. Why Can’t You Buy A Black-and-White Copy Of Your Textbook?

Take a look at your college textbooks.

So many charts and pictures.

So many beautiful colors.

So many unnecessary things.

Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of courses depending on those charts and pictures. But others don’t.

Should they make black-and-white copies available?

They should.

If you need the full-color one, you will buy that.

But if you are short of 20$ to buy the full-color ones, you can settle for the black-and-white versions.

Printing books in black-and-white is cheaper. In several courses, you don’t need any picture. Just black-and-white text is just fine.

28. Do You Know 18 Sites You Can Use To Compare Your Textbooks Price?

If you like to compare the price of your textbooks across 20 or so online bookstores, you want a reliable price comparison site.

Here are 18 options for you to choose. Keep in mind, they are in no particular order. Choose the one that you feel most comfortable and easy to navigate.

1. Bigwords.com

2. Directtextbooks.com

3. BookFinder.com

4. Wecomparebooks.com

5. Textbooks411.com

6. Addall.com

7. Allbookstores.com

8. Campusbooks4less.com

9. CollegeSwapshop.com

10. Bestwebbuys.com

11. Abebooks.com

12. Bestbookdeal.com

13. BookFinder4U.com

14. Booksprice.com

15. Campusbooks.com

16. DealOZ.com

17. Cheaptextbooks.com

18. Ecampus.com

All of these above are search engine to compare textbooks price across 10 or 20 major online bookstores.

They will generally give you the same information since they get the data from similar sites like Half, Amazon, Texbooks.com, and Biblio.com, etc…

There are some really ridiculous price as you go down the listings. But just pay attention to the first half of the search.

The list above is for your reference. You may be familiar with 1 or 2 of them but have never heard of the rest. If you want to hunt for the cheapest deal, you can try all of them.

29. Should You Be Offer A Choice When It Comes To Buying Bundled Textbooks?

Go to the bookstore, take a look at your textbooks. How many of your books are bundled with all of the extra things like study guide, solution guide, interactive CD, online access code, etc…

Notice again if you see the sticker that says “No return if shrink wrap torn off” or something like that.

So what does this mean?

2 things.

• You HAVE to buy all of these extra things although you don’t need them. You just HAVE to. You have no choice.
• Once you buy it, you can’t return the package. Even if you do, they will buy it at 10% of the original price. They will repackage the books and sell them as new to the next student.

You need the main textbook for the course. But how the heck can you read the main text without tearing off the shrink wrap? X-ray vision now, huh?

But once you tear off the shrink wrap, you can’t return the bundled textbook even if you drop the class.

Either way you lose.

So should you allow to choose whether or not you buy the extra stuffs?

You should.

Scratch that.

You must.

You must be allowed to control how you spend your money on textbooks.

Why? because you are a college student.

You are broke.

You have a tight budget.

You earn minimum wage.

You eat instant noodle every other day.

You are always afraid your bank account go to negative at the end of the month.

So who should decide what supplemental materials you should buy? It’s YOU.

Publishers says those extra materials are helpful.  So what? Just make them available if you need it. You will decide if they are helpful or not.  Don’t bundle them altogether with the main text and force you to buy them all.

30. Do You Really Need Priority Shipping When Buying Your Used Textbooks Online?

Now the million-dollar question: to ship media or priority?

You have 1 week before classes start.

If you choose Media Shipping = 4 – 14 days (sometimes up to 21 days)

But for Priority or Expedited shipping =2-6 days.

Your first thought: Priority shipping!

But be careful. Some sellers may not send your book via priority shipping.

Why?

Generally, you will receive your books 4-6 days through media shipping. You wouldn’t pay much attention to the package.

But sometimes, it does take up to 21 days to get there.

You don’t want that. After all, you did pay for Priority or Expedited shipping.

To be sure that you get what you pay, email your seller immediately after you order.

Make sure to tell him (or her) that you paid for Priority Shipping and you need the book within 4-6 days.  When he ships the book, ask him to send you a tracking number.

This email will take about 30 seconds but it will ensure that your book will arrive within 2-6 days because your seller will actually ship it Priority mail.

31. What Types Of Student Buying Their Textbooks At The Bookstore?

3 types of students:

1. College Freshman

Remember those time?

Bookstores love college freshman. So naive and full of hope.

Charge them full-price and they still happily walk out of the store. A nice profit and a happy customer.

Wait until they wise up and know that they can get their cheap textbooks on Half or Amazon at 70% off. Then the bookstore will turn to another mistress – new college freshmen (haha!).

2. Rich Students

They don’t care. If they need something, they buy. Money is not an issue (to those who have it).

3. “Convenience” Lover

These students just love the convenience of the bookstore. They don’t mind paying more for textbooks.

They have good health. They can still work and pay for those textbooks.

So do you buy your textbooks at the bookstore? What type of student are you?

32. Where Are All The Used Textbooks At The Bookstore?

Have you ever tried to grab a used copy of your textbook at the bookstore? Ever find it ?

Bookstores did buy used books after every semester, right?

So where are they?

No clue.

May be this is how it happens.

1. You bought brand-new textbooks

2. You kept them so clean

3. Your bookstore bought them back but as used price

4. Your books are clean so your bookstore wraps them up

5. Your bookstore sells them as brand-new and makes a handsome profit.

No idea if this is actually true. But it can explain the disappearance of all used copies.

Another reason can be that only a few student sold their books back to the bookstore. That’s why only a few used copies are available.

But that can’t be the case.

Right?

Because if that is the case, the book-store buy back price can’t be this pathetically low.

What do you think?

33. Why This Is A Good Idea To Get Cheap Textbooks But It Does Not Work?

Trading, selling, and buying used textbooks with your college mates is a good idea.

In fact, it’s a perfect way to get your textbooks fast and cheap.

I encourage you to do this if you can.

However,

In most cases, this method doesn’t work.

Why?

4 Reasons:

1. You don’t know people who have the textbooks you want

2. You have no way to contact the students who have your books

3. Other students go back home right after the finals (either for Christmas or summer)

4. You have no energy to think about next semester after the finals

This method will work well for YOU if:

1. You live in a dorm and you know students who have taken the courses before

2. You post an announcement to ask for the textbooks 3 weeks before the finals (with contact information and offer price)

3. You keep checking back your announcement if someone has already ripped it off and toss it in the trash

4. You don’t mind negotiating with your college mate

5. You are willing to wait on the campus for a few days to get the books

So trading or buying your textbooks from your college mates is a super idea. But it’s not so convenient.

Buying and selling your textbooks on popular platforms like Half or Amazon is much more practical and cost effective.

34. What’s #1 Surprise When Buying Your Used Textbooks Online?

Hunting your textbooks online is fun. You search early, choose a book, pay for it, wait for it, and finally get it.

Surprise!

A good one too.

The book is not in the condition you order.

You order Good condition.

But you get Like New condition.

It’s exactly like Brand New except there is no shrink wrap.

Clean page. No writing. No highlighting. No dog-eared. Excellent binder.

So you will be super happy. You just find a bargain.

Keep it clean and resell it on Half.com as a like-new condition. You will make some profit on it.

35. Do You Want Free Shipping When Buying Your College Textbooks On Amazon.com?

If you know which textbooks you will need for the next semester, you can buy them at Amazon and get free shipping.

Amazon is running the Amazon Prime Promotions.

What You Can Get?

* Free 2-days shipping

* No minimum purchase

* Trial Lasts 30 days

What You Need To Know Before You Apply?

* Only apply if you actually find your cheapest deals. Your goal is to save more. Not getting free shipping.

* If you try and don’t like it? – Cancel it within 30 days. Do it within 25 days in case you forget. Write down the cancellation number in case you need it.

* If you don’t, you will be charged 79$ per year.

Are You Perfect For This Program?

Yes if you buy tons of books from Amazon.

Yes if you can find the cheapest deals on Amazon.

Yes if you have more than 79$ available in your credit card.

No if you buy 1 or 2 books.

No if you have maxed out all of your credit card.

So what do you decide?

To try or not to try?

36. Why Not Take Advantage Of Your Financial Aid By Hunting For Cheap College Textbooks Online?

If you are in college right now, you are paying by 1 (or more) out of these 4 ways:

* Scholarship

* Loans

* Out of your pocket

* Out of your parent’s pocket

Sum up, it’s your financial aid.

No matter how you are paying for that precious degree, you have a budget set aside for your textbooks.

If you or your parents are paying for your textbooks, you control the budget. You want to find the cheapest deals possible. Whatever that amount is, you pay.

But if you have scholarship or loans, that’s a different story.

Take a look at your financial aid letter, is there an amount set aside for your textbooks?

This expense sometimes is included under the category Personal Expenses. Check to see if you have one!

The amount usually ranges from 400 -750$ per semester. This takes the bookstore’s price into account.

But it’s just an estimate to calculate your financial aid package. You don’t have to spend that EXACT amount .

What you want to do is to spend less than the amount allowed.

If you buy at the bookstore, your textbooks will cost 600$. But if you find cheap deals online, you may only pay 250$. You save 350$.

Once you are done with those books, resell them on Half.com or Amazon, you can easily get back at least 150$ (if no new edition is published).

So after one semester, you save 350$ and get back 150$ = 500$.

How much can you save for your textbook in a year?

That’s one semester. For 2 semesters, you save 1000$.

It’s like you don’t pay for textbooks at all.

You can save this money for the emergency. God knows it does not take a big emergency to blow that 1000$. But at least you get your piece of mind (and sanity) when something does happen.

The most expensive expense in college huh? No way. If there’s a will to save, there are ways to save.

37. What are 2 Things You Need To Know Before Using BigWords.com To Compare Your Textbooks Price?

If you are using Bigwords.com to get the cheapest textbooks prices, there are 2 things you need to know.

BigWords.com is only a comparison engine for your textbooks. In short, it is a referrer.

What does it do?

* It does the search for you for free. * It points you to the exact location to purchase your books. * It even provide you with the instructions to buy your textbooks.

But 2 things BigWords can’t deliver:

1. You can’t call BigWords if you have problems with your order.

If there is any problem, call the vendor that you bought your books from like Half.com or Amazon.

2. BigWords can’t guarantee the delivery time.

BigWords.com doesn’t ship your books. In fact, it has nothing to do with your books once you click on the merchant sites like Half.com or Amazon to purchase the books.

So if you don’t receive your books after a certain date, calling BigWords.com won’t help. They have no idea where your books are and when your books will arrive.

Bigwords.com is helpful but it has 2 important limitations. Why you want to know this? Because you’ll know who to call in case you have problems with your order.

38. What Is The Top Reason You Don’t Want To Bid For Your Textbooks On Ebay?

If you have ever heard of Ebay, you’ll love it. You can get some really awesome and odd things on this site.

But if you are planning to bid for your textbooks on Ebay ? Don’t.

Why?

Because you are not guaranteed to get that textbook.

Bluntly, you might not win the auction.

Buying your college textbooks is a time-sensitive matter.

Bidding period often lasts 7 days. But you don’t have 7 days to wait. Assignments will add up and you will fall behind. No one wants to fall behind in college. It just goes downhill from there.

One more thing is that most auctions will have reserved price. This means if the bid offer is not equal or over the reserved price, you won’t get that book.

You won’t know for sure if you get your book even if you do win the auction. What’s the point of bidding then?

If you decide to buy your books on Ebay, why not buy from Half.com. It is much easier. Just search and buy. No waiting for auction to end.

You may love auctions but it doesn’t work for your textbooks.

39. Buying Your Textbooks From Your Bookstore or Hunting For Your Books Online?

So do you want to know the advantages and disadvantages of buying your books at your bookstore vs. online.

Have 2 minutes? Here we go.

Buying Your Books At The Bookstore:

Advantages

* Walk there in minutes

* Get your books instantly

* Find your books fast (just ask the clerk to point to the exactly location, easy?)

* Return your books instantly if you want to

Disadvantages

* Overpay for them

* Carry heavy books back to your dorm

Buying Your Book Online:

Advantages

* Save money (if you start searching early, you can easily save 50% on your books)

* Search fast using ISBN number

* Pay fixed shipping charge regardless of the size (if buy from Amazon or Half.com)

* Have your books shipped to your dorm

Disadvantages

* Wait for the books (no problem if you buy your books early)

So what do you decide for your next semester? Buying at your bookstore and overpay or searching online and save money?

40. What Is 1 Thing You Should Know Before Asking For Your Refund When Buying Your Textbooks On Half.com?

If you did not receive your textbooks at all, demand a refund from your seller or Half.com.

You may be tempted to contact your credit card company and dispute the charge. But don’t. Half.com wants you to contact your seller directly. If it doesn’t work, you need to contact Half.com.

Know what happens if you dispute the charge with your credit card company before you contact your seller?

You will not be able to sell or buy your books from Half.com anymore.

It’s unfortunate but it does happen.

So if you want your refund, contact your seller and Half.com.

You can even file the claim, but note you only have 60 days to file a Buyer Protection Claim. So demand a timely response from your seller.

You can’t afford to wait. In this type of situation, you may want to buy other copies of your textbooks so you won’t fall behind in class.

Then you can wait as long as it needs to get your money back.

41. When Should You Ask For A Refund When Buying Your Used Textbooks On Half.com?

There are many reasons you can ask for a refund (either full or partial) when you buy your textbooks on Half.com.

3 top reasons to ask for a refund:

* You did not get your books

* You get the wrong books

* Your books are damaged

You can also ask for a partial refund if:

* Delay in shipping

* Book not as described

In all, if you really are not happy with your books, ask for your money back.

You don’t want to be ripped off. Your seller does not want an unhappy customer and a nasty negative feedback.

Work with your seller so it’s a win-win situation.

If you were unhappy in the beginning but your seller compensated for your inconvenience, may be you will consider leaving a positive feedback or at least a neutral one.

42. How Do You Demand A Refund When Buying Your Textbooks On Half.com?

You bought your books online but still haven’t received them. You want a refund.

What can you do?

3 steps in this order.

1. Contact Your Seller Via Email

When you buy your textbooks on Half.com, you will get an email stating when your books should arrive.

If that date passed and you did not get your books, email your seller right away.

You can do that by going into Transactions and choose Contact Seller.

Email him (or her) and states exactly what you want.

* I did not receive the books

* I demand a refund because I need the money to buy the books for classes

You can get your refund by this way. But if your seller refuses to give a refund, move on to step two.

2. Ask For A Refund Again And Leave A Negative Feedback

If your seller gave you non-sense explanations and refused to give back your money, send him a second email.

This time, you do things a bit differently:

* Tell him you did not get your books

* Ask for your refund

* If you don’t get your refund in 2 days, you will be forced to leave a negative feedback

No seller wants negative feedback. If your seller wants to sell any more books in the future, he should give you back your money.

But if this doesn’t work, leave your negative feedback. State clearly your problem like this:

Did not get items. Seller refused to refund. Buyers beware. Never buy from this seller again.

Clear. Simple. Straight to the point. Your seller will regret not to issue your refund.

But if this still does not work, then take it to the next level.

3. File A EBAY Buyer Protection Claim

Before you can file the Buyer Protection Claim, 2 things need to happen:

* The deadline passed

* You already contacted your seller

Then you can file the Buyer Protection Claim. Half.com will investigate your cases and you can get your money from Half.com.

Keep in mind, you only have 60 days from the purchase date to file the claim, so move things along quickly.

This type of situation rarely happens. But if you did not receive your books, you now know what to do to get your money back.

43. Is It Your Fault That The Bookstore Ripped You Off When Buying Back Your Textbooks?

Have you ever feel ripped off by your bookstore?

You spent 700$ on new books only 4 months ago. Now the bookstore only paid you 150$.

Your textbooks still look fine. Excellent binder. Clean page. No writing.

Then why do they buy so low?

The bookstores bought your books pennies on the dollar. Re-wrap them. Resell them to the next student with the original price.

You lost money in the beginning. You lost more at the end.

Why?

Well, because you keep selling your textbooks to them.

When there are sellers, there are buyers.

You continue to resell your books to the bookstores, the buy-back prices will forever be pathetically low.

Buy textbooks low. Sell them high. That’s a pretty sum of profit. Too much profit on your limited budget.

If few students resell their textbooks to the bookstores, then there will be no used textbooks. The bookstores will be forced to increase their buy-back price.

In the long run, it’s better for you.

So is it your fault that the bookstore ripped you off when buying back your textbooks?

If you resell your textbooks to them, then Yes. You are fueling their confidence in ripping off the students.

If you sell your books elsewhere with reasonable price, then No. You avoid from being ripped off.

That’s what every broke college should do to eliminate this outrageous act of killing college students softly with unnecessary expenses.

44. What Are The 5 Advantages Of Downloadable E-Textbooks?

If you are tired of traditional paperback textbooks, do you know that downloadable E-textbooks are available now.

One of the popular company for this service is CourseSmart.com

This is a company owned by 5 publishers that allow you to purchase and download e-textbooks at a lower cost.

5 advantages of Course Smart:

1. E-books are cheaper

Downloadable e-textbooks are 50% cheaper than traditional textbooks.

You don’t have to pay for shipping and don’t have to wait for it. You can view your book in seconds after paying for it.

No more catching up in class because you have to wait for your textbooks.

2. E-books are lighter

It weighs nothing if you only use it on the computer. You can view your books any time as long as there is a computer. You don’t have to drag your books back and forth from your classes.

3. You control what you view

You can highlight or print out any portion of the textbook you want.

If you want to do a group study, just print out the relevant homework problems and bring it to your meeting.

You want to better prepared for your tests by inserting relevant portion of the textbooks in your notes.

4. You don’t worry about reselling your books

Since it’s an e-textbook, you don’t have to worry about reselling. Once you’re done with the final, you’re finished with the course. No more useless textbooks lying around in your dorm. More space for you.

5. You have a wide range of selection

Course Smart currently have more than 6000 titles available in more than 900 courses in more than 100 areas of study. If your course is popular, an e-book for your course may be available for you.

45. What Are The 5 Limitations Of Buying Downloadable E-textbooks?

You want to save some money. You have turned to downloadable E-textbooks from CourseSmart.com

E-books have many advantages but it also has several limitations.

You want to know these limitations before purchasing your e-book to see if this format of textbook is right for you.

5 limitations:

1. You Have To Pay For The Subscription

To access your e-book, you have to register an account and pay a fee. It’s about 50% of the cost of the traditional paperback version.

2. Your E-book Will Expire

Your e-book will expire after 180 days., which is after 6 months after you register for it. Since most semester only lasts 4 months, you have plenty of time to view your e-book.

3. You Will Need A Software To View Your Textbook

You need the CourseSmart Bookshelf Software before you can access your e-book. It’s different whether you’re are using a Mac or  PC.

4. You Will Need A Computer

You will need a computer to access your e-book. With Course Smart, you can either download your book onto your desktop and use it offline OR view your e-book straight from the site.

Either way you need a computer.

5. You Can’t Resell Your Book

This can be an advantage or a disadvantage. If you want to recoup some of your money back then you can’t do it with an E-book. But if you rather not worry about listing, packing, and paying to ship your books, then purchasing an e-book is a good investment.

If the advantages of buying an e-book outweighs its limitations, check CourseSmart.com to see if your book is available in e-book version.

46. Where Can You Buy Your College Textbooks With Free Shipping And Handling?

3 places you can buy your textbooks with free shipping and handling:

1. Amazon

If you buy more than 25$ worth of items on Amazon, you may be eligible for free shipping.

This program is called Free Super Saving Shipping. But 5 things you need to know:

* Your order has to be 25$ or more

* Books that total 25$ must be eligible for Free Super Shipping (you will see Free Super Saving Shipping logo next to your item)

* If any book is not qualified for Free Super Shipping, you have to pay separate shipping charge

* All of your books have to be shipped to one location in US

* Your books may be delayed 3-5 days

2. Ebay

Ebay sellers can set their own shipping charge. But most of the time, the shipping cost can be 0.1$ or even Free.

However, it’s not really free. Some sellers have already added the shipping charge into the price. Others do offer free shipping because they are selling masses of books.

3. Half

You will rarely see Free Shipping on Half.com. However, if you notice that free shipping often comes with a higher price for the book.

So would you rather pay 20$ for the book and 3.99$ for shipping OR would you prefer 40$ for the book and Free Shipping.

Now you know 3 places that can offer free shipping for your books. Is it worth your time to find cheap books with free shipping?

47. Would You Rather Pay Library Late Fees Or Buying Your Textbooks?

So you get rid of the ideas of buying your textbooks. They are too expensive for your budget.

You have only one way out.

Borrow it.

Where?

From the library.

But one problem arises: you have to renew your books every 3-4 weeks.

It’s a pain. I know.

If you can renew your books online. Stop reading this article now. Go do something else.

If you can’t renew them online, just thinking about dragging the books back and forth every 3 weeks make you exhausted.

2 things you can do:

• Ask the librarians to renew your books for you
• Pay the late fee and keep them until the end of the semester

But some librarians won’t renew without scanning the books.

Well, then you have only option 2. Pay the late fee.

If the textbooks costs 160$ new and 70$ used, would you be willing to pay 10$ fine?

Once you pay the fine and return the book, you are done. No reselling. No shipping. No stuffing under your bed.

Keep in mind, the penalty depends on your particular library. Some library will mark the book LOST after a certain period of time and you have to replace the cost of the book.

For the book to be marked LOST, it may need more than 3 months. Why? because the normal check out period is 3 weeks.

So ask you librarian how much you will be charged if the book is overdue. Then you will know if borrowing the books and paying the late fee will cost less than actually buying your books.

48. Do You Know This Tool To Compare All Of Your Textbooks Price At Once?

If you’re a kind of student who take like 6 course per semester and hate searching for your textbooks one by one, use Bigwords.com

I know. The site’s design is… a little out there, but the service is helpful (don’t underestimate the site. It receives 30 millions in investments. And that is way back in 2000).

So what does it do?

You type in the ISBN numbers for all of your books. It searches many stores online and comes back with the cheapest price. It also takes into account any coupons or promotions for you.

If you need to buy like 5 textbooks, you have 2 options:

• Buy all from one store
• Buy each from different store

Either way, Bigwords.com will come back with the lowest price combination for each search. Normally, if you buy from the same store, you will get discount on shipping.

There’s other ways you can modify your search:

• Books conditions
• Store with buyback options
• Shipping period

You can add, delete, or modify your book search to anything you want. It will come back with a cheapest bundle for you. It’s quite a flexible tool.

49. Do You Make This Mistake When Buying Your College Textbooks At Your Bookstore?

Do you hate buying your textbooks from the bookstore? Why? Because you know you will be 100% overcharged. It’s ridiculous.

Although you don’t want it, but sometimes you have to. Why?

Well, because the textbooks you ordered online won’t come for another week.  You ordered late so now you have to wait.

Don’t fall behind in class waiting your textbooks. Buy them directly from the bookstores and use them while you wait.

But keep in mind: Stable the receipt in the books.

Are you rolling your eyes right now because this is so darn obvious?

BUT if you lose the receipt, you can’t return your textbooks. This is also obvious, isn’t it?

Bookstores have no mercy when it comes to returning books. No receipt. No return. Simple. Clear. Brutal.

In a few rare cases, the bookstore manager will work with you to track your transactions. But most of them won’t waste their time. After all, time is money, right?

After you buy the books, stable the receipt into the books. You won’t lose it. One less thing to worry about when it comes to get your money back.

50. Is Bundled Textbook A Money Waster?

Yes.

You are wasting money buying bundled textbooks.

You are used to the fact that whole sale is always cheaper. But not for textbooks.

Publishers include so many extra things with the main textbook to raise the price. They create a delusion that you need these extra resources.

Really? It seems like you don’t even have enough time reading the main textbook.

If you really want the solution guide, why not buy it separately. It is usually much cheaper.

Want to know another reason why your bookstore like to stock bundled textbooks?

Notice that bundled textbooks often come in shrink wrap?

You tear off the wrap. You lose the CD. You can’t return the package.

So what’s the effect of bundled textbooks?

• Cost more
• Reduce the return rate

So depending on the courses, but most of the time, your professors will refer to the main textbook. Sometimes, they only use their own materials in the lectures and never touch the textbook at all.

So be careful with bundled textbooks?

They make you believe that you are saving money but in fact you may be wasting it.

51. Do You Want To Pay 0$ For Your English Textbooks?

Do you need writing requirement to graduate? Yes? Of course, you will have to take one or two English courses.

If you are an English major, you will take tons of English courses.

Don’t waste money on those reading books that are already available free of charge (Ah, 3 wonderful little words) in your college library or your free local library.

All you need is a library card, a 5-10 minutes walk, and you will easily save 50-100$.

Why pay for books when you can get them for free? Also, you will only need to read the book and analyze them in your essays.

You don’t need a brand-new Pride and Prejudice, do you?

If you do, hopefully you are not involved in some kind of dare to see who can waste the most money, are you?

Go get a free library card  so you can have some extra money left for that trip home.

52. Do You Know This One Quick Tip To Pay 0$ For Your College Textbooks?

Here’s a 1-million dollar question for you: Why buy when you can borrow?

That’s right.  A few of your textbooks can be available in your school’s library. After getting the syllabus, do a quick search to see if the library has it. Check the Reserved Desk (you know, books that can only be used in the library).

For English course, find out if your books are available in the library. If yes, run there quickly and borrow it. There are not many copies. They are first come first served.

Keep in mind, you can only borrow books from the library 3-4 weeks. If you need more time, request an extension. You can get 4 more weeks. This is the major setback when borrowing textbooks from the library. However, this method works well for English or History courses since these courses often use old literatures that are readily available in your library.

If you can’t find your textbooks in your library OR you want to have your own copy, search online for the cheapest price.

53. Did You Ask Yourself These 2 Questions Before Buying Used College Textbooks?

So you get the syllabus. Know the book. Run to the bookstore.  Jot down the ISBN number .

Go on line. Start searching. Get the prices. They are much cheaper than at the bookstore. Thinking of clicking the “BUY” button. Wait!

Ask yourself 2 questions:

1. Does your course require doing problems from the book?

2. Does the book have an older edition?

If you have to do homework from the book, buy the most updated edition. You don’t want to run around campus making copies of the homework problems. It’s not worth it.

But, if you don’t have to solve problems from the book, look for the next older edition.  New edition is published every 3-5 years (depending on the subject, of course). If you think the content won’t change that much, buy the old edition. You only need the book for reference. Most of the materials cover in the exam will in the lectures anyway.

If the old edition was published 3 years ago, may be you can still use the book this year. But if the old edition came out 7 years ago, the information are outdated. Buy the new edition.

Decide to buy an older edition college textbook depending on your course.  If you have an English course, consider buying the old edition of the literature. The content basically the same and you will pay much less.

54. Do You Make these 5 Mistakes when Buying Used College Textbooks on Half.com?

Why do you hunt for used college textbooks online instead of buying straight from the bookstore? Well, because you don’t have a trust-fund and you are stuck in a minimum waged job. Bluntly, you have limited amount of money and time.  Buying used textbooks online certainly save you money, but do you want to speed up the buying process so you can have some free time for yourself?

Then, try to avoid these 5 mistakes before purchasing college textbooks on Half.com

1. Lazy to Check your Shipping Address (twice)

If you provide the wrong address, you won’t get the book. You can’t even ask for a refund because the seller already ship the book and has the tracking number.  Do you want to be in this situation? If no, sign in your half.com account and check your shipping address.

Also, if you move to a new address, make sure to update it in your account. You shouldn’t completely depend on the mail forwarding system. It fails (sometimes).

2. Lazy to Update your Payment Method

You will use either Credit Card or Debit Card to pay for your textbooks on half.com. So update your card information regularly. If your card expires, you can’t pay for that cheapest book. Other buyers can rob it from you. You will end up paying a little more for the next cheapest book.

3. Lazy to Read the Descriptions Carefully

Don’t click the BUY button the second you see the cheapest book. Read the descriptions.

Several books have study guide, CD package, or solution guide. So a few seller will put these supplemental resources under the main textbook title with a much cheaper price.  Not sure if you are buying the right book? Send the seller an email.

Before buying your college textbooks, browsing through the available price. Brand new books must be more expensive than acceptable ones.  But the price follows a consistent trend. If all price varies from 30$ – 50$, but one seller sells it for 10$. Read the descriptions.

4. Lazy to Read Seller’s Feedback

Sellers with 99%-100% positive ratings are reliable. But pay attention to the number of item your seller has sold. 1000 books with 99% positive ratings beats 5 books with 99.8%.

If you seller has negative feedback, find out what those are. Common reasons for negative feedback are (from minor to major):

• Delay Shipping
• Bad communication
• Item not as described
• Item not received
• Refund not received

Read the negative feedback. See if you are comfortable with that seller, then proceed to purchase.

5. Lazy to Ask for Tracking Number

Before buying your used college textbooks, ask your seller if he can send you a tracking number after shipping your books. Most sellers provide tracking numbers to protect themselves and their buyers.

Once you receive the email notify your textbook is shipped, ask for the tracking number immediately. Use the number to track your books until you receive it.

Avoid these 5 top mistakes if you want to get your bargain college textbooks fast and with no hassle.

55. What’s The Differences Buying Used College Textbooks on Half.com vs Ebay.com?

Are you familiar with buying cheap used college textbooks on Half.com? If not, read The Secret of Buying Used Textbooks series now.

Done? Good.

Half.com belongs to Ebay.com. If you have an account in Ebay, you can use Half.com easily. If you don’t have an account yet, you can create one here.

Although they belong to the same network, they have 2 different ways of selling used textbooks.

Half.com : direct buy

Ebay.com: bidding system

If you need your textbooks fast, direct buy from Half.com. You can choose the express shipping method so you get your books faster.

Hunting for the cheapest used college textbooks on Ebay.com takes more time due to the bidding system. The bidding period can last as long as 7 days. That means the seller won’t ship the book until the bidding period ends. Also, you don’t know if you will win the bid. If you don’t win, you lose lots of precious time.

So if you want to save time and pay less, buy from Half.com. Ebay bidding system works well for other commodities but not really for used college textbooks.

HTML clipboard

56. See How Easily You can Get the Cheapest Used College Textbooks with Perfect Timing?

Finding the cheapest college textbooks is an art. You need perfect timing.  So when should you begin your hunt?

It’s like real hunting, used textbooks has seasons. Masses of used college textbooks are available right after each semester because students are done with their courses.

Fall semester

However, most used textbooks are sold right around Christmas, coincide with the break between the Fall and the Spring semester.

If you are in the Fall semester, go to Half.com right away to hunt for the Spring semester’s textbooks. Why? Because at that time there are many sellers (mostly students like you) competing for a fast sell (they need to buy new textbooks too). That means you will pay even less.

Do 5 simple things:

• Get textbooks information for the Spring semester
• Find the ISBN number for each book
• Hunt for the cheapest textbooks from Half.com
• Receive the books
• Enjoy the break

Spring semester

Spring semester is a little tricky due to the long summer break. Some college students will sell their used textbooks right after the Spring semester. Others wait until August to list their books online.

Another big problem is you don’t know which textbooks you will need for the upcoming Fall. The syllabus isn’t available until August.

As soon as you get the textbooks information, get the ISBN number, and start hunting your used college textbooks on Half.com

So perfect timing will get you the best deals on used college textbooks. Remember, cheapest textbooks are available after the Fall and right before the Spring semester.

57. How To Protect Your Credit Card When Buying Used Textbooks On Ebay.com?

You can buy used textbooks on Half.com or Ebay.

On Half.com, you pay by credit or debit card. Once you decide to buy the book, you fill in the information and place the order.

However, if you can’t find your textbooks on Half.com, try Ebay. They belong to the same network but they have different inventories.

On Ebay, you can pay as you do on Half.com. However, to avoid filling in credit card information every time you buy a book, you can use Paypal.

Most sellers on Ebay accepts payment from Paypal. It’s a fast and safe way to make payment online.

Paypal is an online payment processor. Once you’re ready to make a payment on Ebay, you just need to sign in your Paypal account. Check the payment details and click send. Your payment will be received in minutes. Better yet, you will see your transaction instantly on your account.

That’s it. You’re done.

No more filling in credit card number, expiration date, security code, routing number, or bank account. Your account is protected.

Want to buy cheap used textbooks on Ebay without exposing your credit card or bank information, register an account at Paypal now. Don’t worry, it’s free.

58. Do You Want To Keep Using PayPal For Free To Buy Used Textbooks on Ebay?

PayPal belongs to the Ebay network. Registering for Paypal is free.  But if you want to continue using PayPal for free, limit your transactions to 500$ per month.

Yes, you would not have known this if you have never used Paypal. But now you do.

It doesn’t matter what you do:

• Sending money to friends
• Paying for your textbooks on Ebay
• Receiving money from your parents
• Transferring money to your bank account
• Getting paid from your customers
• Collecting your donations

Do all of this and stay under 500$ per month. Once you reach the 500$ limit. Wait until next month and it will start over again.

Keep your spending under 500$ and you will use Paypal for free.  Don’t you see, it’s a great way to keep track of your spending.

59. What Are The 6 Reasons You Want To Have An PayPal Account If You’re In College?

You often find cheap deals online. As a college student, it’s no longer a habit to find a bargain. It’s a need.

Let’s face it, financial aid package can barely cover your basic needs. There’s no fund set aside for emergency.

You have to hold on to little money you have. How? by protecting your credit card and bank account number to prevent unauthorized charges. How do you that? Create an PayPal account to pay for your items when you buy online.

Need more reasons? Here they are.

1. Protect Your Credit And Bank Account

Whenever you want to buy a textbook on Ebay you just need to sign into your PayPal account and pay. No fear of having your credit card number stolen.

2. Use Your Account On Popular Online Sites

Walmart, CompUSA, iTunes,  eBags, Ebay, and Onlineshoes all accept Paypal payment.

3. Connect PayPal Account to Your Bank Account

Connecting your bank account to your PayPal account allows you to transfer money back and forth with no problem. It says it would take 3-4 days for the transfer. But my personal experiences show that it usually take about 1-2 days.

4. Get The Money From Your Parents In Seconds

If you’re searching for your used textbooks on Ebay and found the cheapest price. Too bad, you’re short of 20$ to buy the book (it happens more often than you think).

If your parents have a PayPal account, they just need to send the money to your Paypal email. That’s it. You’ll get the money and grab that bargain.

5. Raising Funds With Ease

If you belong to an organization (Sorority, Fraternity, Bible Study Group, etc…) and you need a way to collect donations? Create an account at Paypal and add a PayPal button on your site or blog. That’s a faster way to receive donation from people who also have a PayPal account. Checks takes way too long to arrive.

6. Get Payment For Your Work Online

If you’re a graphic designer and work part-time online designing logos for websites and blogs, Set up a Paypal account get payment faster. If you need to make a refund, your customers also get that back in seconds.

When you have a Paypal account, you don’t have to worry about check bounce or credit card denial. Get the payment, focus on your job, and have more time finding new customers.

See a good deal, pay for it fast. Short of money, get it fast.

See, having an PayPal account save you money AND time. Create One Now.

60. If You Don’t Know This About The College Used Textbook Market, You Will Hate Yourself By The End Of The Semester.

You have your used college textbooks. You are happy sailing through the semester.

It’s the end of the semester, you want to resell them back to get back some of your money. But you almost faint (a bit exaggerated) to find out that your books can only sell for 2$ (yes, you read right two dollars).  Why?

One simple explanation: new edition of your college textbook is available.

Whenever a new edition of your college textbook is published, the old edition’s value drops drastically.  You don’t even want to resell it on Half.com because you can’t cover the shipping cost. The cheapest shipping method (media shipping) already costs 3.50$. You don’t want to lose money. So you have two choices: donate or recycle.

Notice that the new edition of a college textbooks is published every 3-5 years, depending on the subject. A few subject like Biology, new edition is available for every 1-2 years. However, the price really outweighs the slight updates.

So if your intention is to resell your used college textbooks at the end of the semester, pay attention to the publication year. If  your edition is published 3-5 years ago, it’s more likely that the new edition will come out soon.

If your edition is dirt cheap, then go ahead – purchase it. You won’t lose much money. But if your edition is expensive, you have two choices:

1. Buy that edition anyway

2. Wait to see if the new edition will come out (your professors should be aware of this)

If  you buy the new edition, you will get more money back since used books are not available yet. You can get back 80% of your money back if you do these 3 simple things:

1. Keep the book looks like Brand New

2. Sell the textbook right after finishing your course

3. Avoid selling back to the bookstore (the most they will pay you is 50%)

Now you won’t hate yourself at the end of the semester.

61. Do You Know These Top 2 Problems when Hunting Used College Textbooks on Half.com?

If you are reading this far, you are mastering the art of cutting textbooks cost from your budget.  However, sometimes the transactions doesn’t go as smoothly as you like. Here are the top 2 problems when buying used college textbooks at Half.com and how you can resolve them:

1. Your Textbooks Took too Long to Arrive

It takes 7-14 days for the book to come if shipped via media mail and 3-5 days via express mail. If you have waited more than that, send an email to your seller.

You can do so by going into Transactions, click on the drop down menu, choose Contact Seller. Fill out the form. State your problems clearly. Ask for the tracking number. Nicely demand a prompt response.

The seller often will response within 24 hours with an explanation or a tracking number. With the tracking number, you will know where are your textbooks and when will they arrive. In most cases, you will get your textbooks. They are just a little delay due to the (sometimes imperfect) mail system.

Keep in mind, always leave feedback after you get your books. Then, you can leave an honest feedback for future buyers.

2. You Didn’t Get Your Textbooks At All

This rarely happen because sellers want positive feedback to encourage future sales. But there is a tiny chance that it does happen, how can you deal with it ?

Send the seller an email telling him you did not receive the book as promised. In most of the cases, the seller will give you a full refund if the seller did not have a tracking number to prove that he (or she) has mailed the book. Thus nowadays, sellers will provide the tracking number to ensure problems like this never happen.

But if your seller refuse to refund your money, take your action to the next level. Leave a negative feedback stating clearly that you did not receive the goods from this particular seller and future buyers beware. I’m sure that seller won’t survive in this business for long because no sane person would want to give money to someone who won’t ship their goods.

Now you want your money back. Drag Half.com administrators into this. File a claim 48 hours after contacting the seller and demand your refund.

Here are 2 important quotes regarding Buyer Protection Policy from Half.com if you don’t receive your items:

“We make every effort to provide you with the best possible shopping experience. This means that items you purchase should be delivered to you and should be usable when they arrive. There are times however when a purchase doesn’t work out as it should. To protect our Buyers, we offer the Buyer Protection Policy. Every Half.com Buyer is covered under the Buyer Protection Policy for the first $750 of every purchase”

“Once a claim has been submitted, it is sent to our Trust and Safety team for review. They may need to contact one or both of the transacting parties for more information. If the problem can’t be resolved, a refund and/or return may be issued/requested at the discretion of Half.com, and Half.com may debit a seller’s account.”

Search full official statement regarding Buyer Protection Policy so you can understand how it works.

SELL YOUR USED COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS

62. Know 1 New Way Publishers Use To Stop You From Reselling Your Used College Textbooks?

Have you ever bought a textbook that come with a code to access additional resources online that would expire after 4 months?

Yes?

Thought so.

It’s pretty common format for college textbook right now.

In the past, if you bought a paperback textbook from your bookstore, you sold it back for pennies on the dollar.

Now if you buy a textbook with access code and that access code expires, your bookstore will buy it back for pennies on the dime.

Do you keep your access code?

Yes.

Does it expire yet?

Yes.

Then we will have to pay you less for it.

Ok.

NO!

Not OK.

Sell you textbooks online. There is little difference in price between a book with and without access code.

Don’t sell yourself short to your bookstore. It will always find more reason to pay you less for it.

Why do you keep endure this harassment?

63. Do You Hate Your Bookstore or Just Its Pathetic Textbooks Buy-Back Program?

Do you hate your bookstore?

No.

It’s place that you can relax. There are tons of books in every subject imaginable. There are magazines if you need to get your gossip pump for the day.

If your bookstore has a cafeteria, that’s where you will go to get lunch. The environment is great.

So in all, it’s a wonderful place…

Do you hate its textbooks buy-back program ?

Yes.

Absolutely yes.

If you take a look at the archive, you’ll see lots of articles opposing bookstore’s buy-back program. Yes, it’s that bad.

You are a college student. You are broke. Isn’t it a common knowledge that 99% of college students have to live on a limited budget?

Then it does not make sense to charge high – buy low – charge high again for the textbooks, isn’t it?  It’s a high-way robbery.

Would it kill them to pay 60$ for a book that costs 100$? Why pay only 20-30$?

Because you hate its buy-back program, you apply that feeling to the whole bookstore.

It’s like doing your courses’ evaluation. If you hate your first class, your second class will more likely to get a low mark as well.  Can’t help it. Just the way it is.

If you still want to enjoy the bookstore environment, go to a place where they don’t deal with college textbooks.

I have a Barnes & Nobles bookstore near my house. Love it. Very relaxing environment. No college textbooks.

Willing to pay full price if really interested in a book. No pressure. No stress. Life is good.

64. 1 Tip You Want To Know If You Want To Auction Your Reading Books On Ebay

If you want to sell your textbooks online, list your textbooks on Half.com or Amazon:

Ebay bidding system does not work well for textbooks.

3 reasons:

• You will need money to list your books
• You need to update your auctions regularly
• Sometimes you don’t have a bid or a buyer

So Ebay’s auctions are not for individual college textbook sale.

But if you have a bunch of reading books from the same author or genre, you can still use Ebay bidding system.

Auction all of your books as a lot of 4 or more books.

When you gather all of your books like that, you are more likely to get a bid.

So have lots of books? Put them into categories and auction them on Ebay. See how high you can sell.

65. Can You Make Money When Buying And Selling Your Used College Textbooks?

Sure you can.

Know about stock trading?

It’s like that.

Buy low. Sell high.

Simple but profitable.

Just like any other stuffs, textbooks have different price at different period of time. Take advantage of this.

Keep in mind, you have to stay within the price range. Never go above, you will not make a sale. Go below and you will lose money.

Stay within the price range!

Take one example so it’s will be easier for you to imagine how you can pay 0$ for your textbooks but also make a little extra money with them.

1. 3 weeks before the class starts in September, you know exactly which book to buy.

2. Search on Half.com or Amazon, find it. It costs 50$.

3. Great! Buy it. Use it. Keep it clean. Finish with it.

4. List your books for sale on Half.com in December for the Spring semester. See the price range 55-75$

5. Set your book for 65$ since the book is clean.

6. Make a sale. Pay 0$ for your book. Profit 15$ pocket money.

It’s not a guarantee that you will make much money. The price range changes every day. But do you feel good that you pay 0$ for your textbook?

66. Should You Offer Expedited Shipping When Selling Your Used Textbooks Online?

When you sell your used textbooks online (for example, on Half.com or Amazon), you can offer your buyer either:

* Media Shipping

* Media and Expedited Shipping.

Now should you offer your buyer Expedited Shipping?

The real question is: Will you actually use Expedited Shipping when you ship your books?

It costs more and you have to keep track of which buyer request Expedited Shipping.

If you are selling lots of books and don’t want to keep track of different shipping requests, allow media shipping only.

One advantage of offering Media Shipping only is that your buyer expects a longer delivery time. If your book gets there early, you have a happy buyer.

A happy buyer= positive feedback= more sale in future.

67. When You Can Sell Your Books Back To Your Bookstore?

You know you will only get a few bucks when reselling your textbooks back to your bookstore.

That applies to most of your books but…

if you bought a book on Half.com for 2 $ and your bookstore is willing to pay 7$ for it, do you sell?

Of course. That’s a 5 $ profit.

Why not, right?

But which books will work in this case?

Reading books. You know, books for English courses, for example.

You can buy brand-new reading books on Half.com or Amazon for pennies on the dollars. Keep it clean. Then you resell them for dimes on the dollars.

It’s fast sell and you make a little money.

68. What’s  #1 Logic Why You Sell Your Textbooks To Your Bookstore And Get Ripped Off?

You were done with your courses. You had tons of textbooks you want to get rid of.

You ran to your bookstore. You were hoping you would get some of your money back. After all, you did pay 600$ for 4 books at this exact store 4 months ago.

Few minutes later…

You came out. Upset. You only got 150$ for all 4 books. 450$ is down the drain.

A thought crosses your mind.

Something is better than nothing, right?

Have you ever thought like this?

Likely.

I have.

But that’s not what you think.

What you really want to scream out is:

It’s unfair. I got ripped off and I can’t do a damn thing about it. I hate buying textbooks. I hate the whole idea of textbooks. Why don’t they just upload the material online and do away with textbooks altogether!

If you realize that what you really want to say, you will find ways to hunt for cheaper textbooks online. I have lots of tips here to help you pay less for your textbooks or resell them at a higher price.

You can’t do away with textbooks any time soon, but you can always buy cheap textbooks. Know why? Because there will always be students like you and I, who will sell their textbooks online (for example, on Half or Amazon) at a reasonable price.

69. What are the 3 Tips To Protect Your Textbooks So You Can Sell Them For More Money Online?

Let me ask you something.

Which book will you charge for more?

A clean one.

Or the one that has missing pages and has writings all over it.

If I’m a buyer, I am willing to pay more for a clean book.

So to sell your textbooks for more? Keep them clean.

Simple enough.

So here are 3 tips to protect your textbooks:

1. No writing

Please don’t write all over your textbooks. Use a note pad.

2. No highlighting.

Fight your temptation to highlight anything and everything. You know you don’t need to remember that much.

If you want, write a sentence or two to summarize what you want to highlight.

But this tip can’t apply to English courses. When you write essays, you may want to come back to certain paragraph. It’s easier if that paragraph is highlighted.

3. No dragging book all over the place

Do you have a habit of dragging your big textbook to class everyday without using it?

Yes?

Then stop doing that.

If you know you will not use your textbook during lecture, leave it at home.

If you know your library has several copies of your textbook on reserved, leave it at home.

If you know you will meet friends and will not need the book to study, leave it at home.

Why?

Because dragging your books all over the place can damage your binder.

All 3 things will reduce the value of your textbooks.

If your book has no writing, no highlight, and has excellent binder, you can tell your buyer that it’s like new. That means you can charge the Like New price.

Otherwise, the best you can do is to charge Good price. Sometimes, if your book is damaged too much, you may have to charge Acceptable price.

Will you pay more for Like New book or Acceptable book?

70. Did You Know About This Program To Sell Your Used Textbooks On Amazon.com?

4 ways you can sell your used textbooks:

* List your books on Half.com (best)

* List your books on Amazon (next best)

* Sell your Books To Online Buy Back programs (be careful – a few will pay less than your bookstore)

* Sell your books to your bookstore (not recommended in the mean time -unless they raise their buy back price)

There is a 5th way to sell your books. May be you want to try.

Amazon Easy Sell Program

What Do You Do In This Program?

* You ship your books to Amazon

* Amazon stores them in their warehouse

* Amazon will ship your books when someone buys them

* You get your money

What You Need To Know Before Joining Easy Sell?

* Free to join

* Storage for your books is free for first 60 days

* After that, you will be charged per cubic feet per month: 0.45$ (Jan – Sept) and 0.60$ (Oct – Dec)

Do You Have To Pay Amazon’s commission?

Yes.

3 commissions

1. 0.99$ set fee

2. 1.35$ closing fee (it can be variable)

3. 15% of final amount

Is This A Perfect Way For You To Sell Your Used Textbooks?

Yes. If:

* You don’t want to worry about shipping your books one by one

* You don’t mind paying Amazon some fees to do everything for you

* You are familiar to Amazon and prefer to sell your books online but too lazy to do it.

71. What Are The Top 3 Reasons You Don’t Want To Put Up Your College Textbooks For Auctions On Ebay?

Are you planning to sell your college textbooks? Are you thinking about putting your college textbooks for auctions on Ebay?

Here are the top 3 reasons you don’t want to do that.

1. Fees For Listing

If you list your college textbooks on Ebay, you will have to pay at least 2 kind of fees.

* Insertion Fee – money to get your auctions listing on Ebay * Final Value Fee – money to pay after your books is sold

2. Bidding Period

You can set the bidding period. But then you have to keep track of your auction.

Why can you just wait until your auction end and ship your items to the highest bidder?

Well, because the winner may want to cancel the bid . You have to approve his cancellation. That means the winner might not want the item at all and you might have to start the auction again. Too much work.

3. Reserved price

To attract buyers, most auctions will start the bidding at 0.01$. So cheap.

That’s great if you are the buyer. You can get a good deal here.

Not too great if you are the seller. You’re looking at a loss. If the auction ends at 1$, you have to ship your book for 1$.

100$ book for 1$? Are you mad? 1$ does not even cover the shipping charge.

To prevent this, you have to place in the reserved price. That’s the lowest price you will sell. This way you don’t have to worry about selling yourself short.

But there is one big problem. If the offer does not reach your reserved price before the auction ends, you will have to start another auction all over again.

Too much drama for just selling your book.

Why don’t you just list them on Half.com?

No fee. No wait. No drama.

72. What Are 3 Things You Can Put Your Textbooks In When Selling Your Textbooks Online?

Are you selling your books online? Are you ready to ship but have no clue what can you put your textbooks in?

3 ways.

2 of them are free. 1 costs about 0.99$.

1. Old Newspaper

If you have old newspaper, especially the advertisement page (because it’s quite large), use it to wrap up your book. It’s like you are recycling your newspaper. Feel good?

However, newspaper is easily torn off. You should only use it to wrap light books. To be sure that the edges of your package will not be torn off, tape the 4 edges carefully.

2 Free Shipping Box From USPS

Run to your local United States Postal Services office and grab the free boxes over there. But the problem is all of the boxes are for priority shipping.

Don’t worry. Just grab 1 or 2 boxes. Go home and wrap the box in old newspaper. Then you can ship it media mail or whichever method you want.

While you are there, grab a few self-adhesive shipping labels so you can slap one on your box.

Only use boxes to ship your heavy books. But expect to pay a bit more because of the box.

3. 0.99$ Wrapping Paper

If you have no old newspaper or boxes, you can buy wrapping paper at the dollar store for 0.99$. Just grab any kind is fine because you are going to wrap your book in which the white side will be outside.

Why? Because it’s less confusing when you slap the shipping label on.

The postman just need to see the TO and FROM information. So try to keep everything clean and simple.

Remember to tape all the edges of your packages.

There, 3 ways for you to wrap your books when selling online. 2 are free and 1 costs 0.99$. Easy enough?

73. Do You Want To Lose Money When Selling Your Used College Textbooks Online?

Hopefully, your answer is NO.

You may have heard of many online bookstores, right? I don’t want to name names here, but if you just go to Google, you will see tons of them.

So you never sell textbooks online before, what site should you list your books?

Before you decide, let me ask you one thing.

Between 2 sites, 1 has 50 millions visitors and the other have 1 million visitors. Where do you go to sell your books?

Hopefully, the site that has 50 millions visitors.

Why? Because 50 millions visitors =50 million potential buyers.

However, there are some sites out there ( sites that don’t have 50 millions visitors) will offer to sell your textbooks for you.

Know how they are going to make money?

Simple.

You list your books on their sites. They list your books on Ebay. They mark up the price. You pay Ebay’s commission AND their commission.

So you pay 2 fees. You lose money.

And why would you want to do that?

If you want to sell your textbooks and only pay commission 1 time, list them directly on Ebay.

Better yet, list your textbooks on Ebay. You can target college student buyers directly.

HTML clipboard

74. Did You Know These 2 Things Before Setting The Price For Your Used Textbooks On Half.com?

Now before setting the price, take 2 things into account:

1. Half.com Commission
2. Shipping Costs

So how much is Half.com commission?

It depends on how much you will get for your used textbooks.

But the general rule is:

15 % for sale that is over 50$

12.5% for sale that is from 50.1$ -100$

10% for sale that is from 100.1$-250$.

How Much Will You Be Compensated For The Shipping?

Half.com will charge your buyer a fixed shipping charge.

For hardcover books

• Media mail 3.99$ per book
• Expedited 5.99$ per book

For soft-cover or audio book

• Media mail 3.49$
• Expedited 5.49$

How Much Should You Set The Price For Your Books?

If your book is light, it does not matter.

But if your book is so darn heavy, you will lose money when shipping the book. 3.99$ won’t cover the shipping cost.

What do you do?

Add a partial shipping cost to your selling price. 2-3 dollars will do.

So 2-3$ extra plus 3.99 from Half.com, you will have 6-7$ to ship your book. Your won’t your lose money.

You know about the commission right?

If you want, you can add an additional 1-2$ into your asking price. Keep in mind however, the higher the selling price, the higher the commission since it is the percentage.

But if you don’t care because you are too happy you did not get ripped off by your bookstore, then don’t worry about the commission.

Happy selling.

75. Do You Know This 1 Tool To Help You Compare All Buy Back Prices At The Same Time To Get The Highest Offer Fast?

Have only one used textbooks and you want to sell it fast? Don’t want to go to 11 online bookstore to find out the offer?

Here’s a tool to compare all of the offers from at least 13 buy-back vendors for you.

Direct Textbook Buy Back comparison tool

You just need to enter 1 ISBN number, it will compare all the offer for you. Easy enough?

But, one set back of this tool is that you can only compare 1 used textbook at a time.

Have 5 books? Go directly to the site where you can enter multiple ISBN numbers. You will get an offer for all of your textbooks.

Keep in mind, what you get through these buyback program is much less than if you sell your used textbooks on Half.com.

Know why? Because these vendors will resell your books to other students. If they pay you too much money, there will be no profit for them.

But, all is not lost. You get your money fast. That’s what you want, right?

76. Who Else Wants To Know 11 More Buy Back Programs Online To Get Quick Cash For Your Used Textbooks?

You have tons of used textbooks clogged in the back of your closet? You wan to know how much you can sell them.

Here’s 11 more textbooks Buy Back Program Online. Enter all of your books ISBN to see which one give you the highest offer.

But remember, if you can’t find the contact information, don’t do business with them.

Why? Who’s in heaven are you going to contact if you have question about your business?

Ready? Here’s we go. 11 programs in no particular order.

1. BooksValue

2. Etextshop.com

3. Textbookswheel

4. Abebooks

5. ValoreBooks

6. TextbooksRus

7. Textbooks

8. Webuytextbooks

9. BookByte

10. Textbookbuyer

11. Ecampus

Keep in mind, use these buyback program if you:

* Need quick cash (2 weeks)

* Don’t mind getting less money

But if you want more money and don’t mind waiting a little bit more, list your books on Half.com.

77. Do You Know This 1 Tool For You To Trade Or Sell Your Used Textbooks With Your Local College Students Fast?

Here’s new tool for you:

Fusko – For U Kollege Students Only

6 things you want to know:

1. What’s Fukso?

Fusko, aka For U Kollege Students Only.

It’s a site for you to set up a place to trade textbooks with your college mates who have taken the same courses.

Its creator is Eric Fuller, from the University of Florida.

It’s a relatively new service. About 2 years.

2. What Fukso Can Do For You?

It’s a free service to help you set up a textbook trading zone for your college. Since some of your college students take the same courses as you do, they will have the right textbooks you want to buy or trade.

It’s a convenient tool for you to sell or buy textbooks fast and right on your campus. That means no shipping charge.

The place where the textbooks traders meet is called the Student Trade Zone.

3. How Can Fukco Set Up A Trading Zone?

Students Trade Zones are your local business places. It’s a win-win situation for the business and the students. You have a safe place to trade your textbooks. The business has the opportunity to advertise its service to local college students.

4. What Can You Do On Fukso?

3 Simple things:

• Check to see if your campus participate in the program
• Create an account
• Set up meeting place and time to trade your textbooks with your college mates

5. What If Your Campus Does Not Participate In Fukso?

Add it to the list on Fusko. Wait for the email from Kukso for further instruction on local Student Trade Zones.

6. What Do You Need To Look Out For?

Remember. Kukso is only a free service to connect you with your college mates. It has no control on your trades.

Only agree to trade if you are comfortable with the price and the quality of the books. If not, consider buying them on Half.com. The textbooks are cheaper there.

78. Do You Know These 9 Things Before Participating In An Instant Buy Back Program For Used Textbooks Online?

Now before participating in this program, 9 things you need to know:

1. Not Any Condition Is Accepted.

Your books will be sold as “USED” book. However, your book must be used book in excellent condition. What conditions?

• Excellent binder
• Clean page
• No missing page
• Your answer to Barnes & Nobles moral question : Will you buy that book in its present condition?

2. You May Get A Lower Price.

Used books have lower price. You can get less money for your books selling them to Barnes & Nobles. But one advatage is that you know instantly how much you will get for your books.

3. You Don’t Need To Pay For Shipping.

That’s right. Once you know how much you will be paid for your used textbooks, Barnes and Nobles will send a shipping label to you.

This is great, isn’t it? You already sell your textbooks at a lower price, it makes sense that they should pay for the shipping.

4. You Can Lose Your Books if They Do Not Meet The Requirements

If you are sending textbooks that have too many writings, missing pages, and mold, etc… Barnes & Nobles will throw them out and you will not get paid for them.

So take a look at your textbooks’ conditions before sending them in.

5. You Have to Include The Email Confirmation When Shipping Your Books

Type in the ISBN number. Get the quote.  Agree to sell. Receive an email confirmation. Include a copy of that email in the box of the books.

6.  You Can Only Sell Your Used Textbooks If You Can Get At Least 10$ For Them

It’s just what it says. If you can get 10$ or more for your books, send them in. If not, Barnes & Nobles is not going to take them. Even if you do send in the books, you will not get paid for them.

Don’t stuff them under your bed again! Donate them.

7. You Can Sell Used Textbooks Without The CD

Several textbooks include CD. You can sell your used textbooks WITH or WITHOUT CD. With complete CD set, you may get more for your textbooks.

8. You Will Have 2-3 Weeks To Get The Check

9. If You Did Not Receive Your Check

Barnes & Nobles Customer Service Center

1-800-THE-BOOK

OR 1-800-843-2665

It’s better to talk to a live person when it comes to money.

79. What’s 1 Worse Mistake You Can Make When Shipping Your Textbooks To An Online Buy Back Programs?

Do you know you can sell your used textbooks instantly online? No?

Well, you can.

There are 2 programs:

1. Barnes and Nobles Sell Your Textbooks program

2. Alibris Sell Your Book Program

So the two programs are quite similar. The difference may be which one will pay you more for your books.

But one problem can arise when shipping your textbooks to them: the textbooks get lost.

They send you a shipping label, you ship your books. But what if they say they never receive them? What do you do now?

Prevent this problem by asking for a Tracking Number or purchasing a Delivery Confirmation receipt.

You can personally track your package and call the vendor to confirm the delivery.

Now if the operator tells you that he (or she) did not receive your used textbooks yet, you can tell him (or her): ” I got the tracking number right here and it says my package was delivered. I will call back in 2 days to check the status and the payment. Would you like the tracking number to see for yourself?”

How do you feel?

Does it feel good to have a comeback to a question?

However, if the Delivery Confirmation request costs more than what you will get for the books, don’t sell your books. You will either break even or lose money.

If you want, you can try listing your textbooks on Half.com. But first, you have to create an account.

If all fails, donate your used books to your local non-profit organization. See if you are near a collection bin.

80. Do You Want To Know One More Instant Buy Back Program For Your Used Textbooks Online?

Have you tried to see how much Barnes & Nobles is willing to pay for your used textbooks?

So? Are you satisfied with what you get?

No. Here is one more place you can try.

Alibris Sell Your Book Program

This program is similar to Barnes & Nobles Sell Your Textbooks program.

Follow 6 steps:

1. Type in the ISBN number
2. Get the quote
3. Create an account
4. Print the shipping label
5. Ship your books
6. Get your money

But, there are 3 differences from Barnes & Nobles program:

1. You can print your shipping label right away
2. You get your money within 5 days
3. You can get money by check or Paypal. You will get money much faster with Paypal

If you have more question regarding shipping your books, contact Alibris. You can only contact them through email.

If you prefer talking to a live person, Barnes & Nobles may be a better choice.

So? Did you check these 2 places? Which pays you more? Sell your books to them.

If the money is not enough to cover a small cup of iced coffee at Starbucks, consider donate your books.

81. How Can You Find Out How Much Your Used College Textbooks Are Worth?

Have tons of textbooks at the end of the semester? The bookstore bought back a few of them. However, you still have a few and are wondering if it’s worth to sell them online?

Want to know how much are your textbooks worth?

Use this Direct Textbooks tool to search.

Grab a book.  Type in the ISBN number in the Search box.

Done? See tons of listings from several of the online bookstores ?

There is a wide range of price but take a closer look at Half and Amazon price. They are more accurate.

It’s easy, isn’t it? Using the ISBN number to find out how much your textbooks worth. If they are not worth the shipping cost, then you can always donate your used textbooks to a non- profit organization. Don’t let them cram up your space!

82. Who Wants To Know Where You Can Sell Your Used Textbooks Instantly Online?

Cleaning up your room and found your used textbooks stacking up under your bed covered in dust?

You tried to sell them to your bookstore but they refused to buy back because there’s a new edition available (or some other reason that the clerk manage to make up)?

Don’t worry. Check this place to see if you can sell your used textbooks instantly.

Barnes & Noble Sell Your Textbooks program

6 steps to resell your used textbooks instantly online:

1. Type in ISBN number to find out the price

2. Get a quote

3. Like the price they are willing to pay you

4. Wait for shipping label from Barnes & Nobles

5. Ship your books for free

6. Wait for the check to roll in

Easy enough?

Too many books lying around ? Check this tool to see if you can get back some money instantly.

If you are willing to wait to sell your used textbooks, create an account and list them on Half.com

If you can only sell your used textbooks for pennies on the dollar, donate them. There are tons of students who would love to have your textbooks.

83. Do You Know This 12 Simple Steps To List Your Used Textbooks on Half.com For Sale?

You keep hearing about other students selling their used textbooks online, but you never try.

If you want to sell your used textbooks on Half.com? Get a textbook you want to sell and follow these 12 steps to list the book:

1. Create an account (if you still don’t have one yet). It’s free and it’s still there if you don’t use it.

2. Turn the book over, look to the lower right. See the ISBN number. It’s right below or above the bar code.

3. Type this ISBN number into the Search box. ISBN number has 10 digits. If the number has 10 or 13 in the beginning, ignore it. For example, 0321543254.

4.Check to see if the search gives back the right book. Check the author, the title, and  the edition. Is everything correct?

5. Look to your upper right near the Square that says Best Price. See Sell My Copy? Click it.

6. Select Conditions. Look at your book and select the appropriate category.

7. Fill in the Comments.  Answer these 4 questions:

• How’s the binder? Excellent? If yes, type in Excellent binder.
• Clean page? Yes?
• Ship to all 50 states or only 48 lower states (excluding Alaska and Hawaii)?
• Do you think your book is a bargain compared to the bookstore? Tell that to the buyers.

8. Fill in the Descriptions ( personally I think it’s optional). If you have something more to say, feel free to put it here.

9. Set the price. What’s the price range?

10. Click to list your textbook. Go get a coffee, come back in 10 minutes and you will see your listing go live.

11. Check your listing. Type in the ISBN number of your book and see if your book is listed.

12. Close the browser. Enjoy life. Wait for the email: ” You have made a sale, please ship the item #123455….”.

84. Do You Know This 1 Little Known Technique To Sell Your Used College Textbooks Faster On Half.com?

Want to sell your used textbook faster? Manipulating your price. Here’s how.

You have your textbooks. Use the ISBN number to find it. Click Sell My Copy and fill in the Comments and Descriptions.

Now, you set your price. You wait. You are impatient because no one buys your books yet. You need the money (for whatever).

Here’s what you do.  Go to your account. Look to your left. See Manage Inventory. Click there. Now you change your price. Not just any price.

BUT…

Set your price 1-2 cents below the lowest price.

I call this “Run in front of the herd” technique.  Why this technique is effective? 3 reasons:

1. Lowest price appears in the front page – more exposure to potential buyers
2. Buyers are mostly college student looking to save – attract to the lowest price
3. Your price appears in Best Price section – attract the first visitor right away

Keep in mind, however, you need to check your price regularly. You want your price to be the lowest price. Sure you will lose 1-2 cents but in return you will sell faster and get the money faster.

85. What Are The 3 Worse Mistakes You Can Make When Selling Your Used College Textbooks On Half.com?

What do you do with your textbooks when you finish your courses? 3 options:

• Sell them
• Donate them (Recycle bin?)
• Leaving them at home to further scram up little space you have

Oh, you decide to sell? Great. Avoid these 3 mistakes (they’re the worst mistakes you can make as a seller):

1. Lie About Your Products

Can’t stressed this enough. Describe your book as is.

Keep in mind, buyers are college students like you. Most often, they are broke too. So be kind and inform them about your textbooks’ condition truthfully. They will come back with positive feedback.  Positive feedback will help you sell more. You want to sell next semester’s textbooks when you’re done with them, right?

2. Set Your Price In Heaven

Why heaven? Because it’s too darn high. If the average price is 20-40$, don’t set it 100$. No soul will ever have the chance to look at your books because they’re buried under tons of cheaper copies.

3. Use Your Real Name And Address When Shipping Your Textbooks

You’re not blackmailing someone, are you? Use your real name and address.

Why? Simple. Your textbooks can be returned to you if:

• The books are shipped to the wrong address
• The buyer move and forget to update the information
• The forwarding mailing system fails (more often than you think)

If the books can’t be returned to you, you lose the book AND the money. What you get? An unhappy buyer and (may be) a negative feedback. Who wants negative feedback?

So now you know 3 worse mistakes you can make as a seller on Half.com. Avoid them.

86. What Are The 5 Reasons To Sell Used Textbooks On Half.com?

Finished your courses? Have textbooks to sell? Thinking of selling them to the bookstore and get what? 30$ for a textbook you paid 160$ (assuming you bought it new straight from the bookstore).  Don’t sell yourself short. Sell it online, you can get more money back.

There are many places you can sell your textbooks online. But let’s start with Half.com first.

Here’s 5 reasons:

1. Half.com is a popular site to sell college textbooks. There are many sellers and lots of potential buyers. You can sell fast. Get the money to buy new textbooks.
2. You don’t need to take picture of your textbooks. Just use the ISBN number and find your textbooks. The picture is provided for you. Describe the book for your buyers. Set the price.
3. Your payment is secure. Half.com will collect the payment. Half.com notifies you when the payment is received. You ship your books. You get paid twice each month, on the 15th and 30th.
4. You can easily monitor the price range of your textbooks.  Never fear of setting your price too high or too low.
5. Go on a vacation and can’t ship your textbooks? Set your account to Vacation mode and potential buyers won’t see your inventory.

But to enjoy all of these advantages, you have to create an account at Half.com. You can use the same account to BUY and to SELL on Half.com.  You can sell your used textbooks for more money and spend less for next semester’s textbooks.

87. Do You Want To Know The Perfect Time To Sell Your Used College Textbooks On Half.com?

You’re a college student. You’re not a textbook vendor who has all the time in the world to sell their books. You need the money to buy new textbooks for the next semester. Fast. So when to sell your used textbooks?

3 time periods (for a student) to sell: May, August, and December.

It coincides with the beginning and ends of your semester.

Once you finish your Fall course, you sell your books in December. Get the money to buy new textbooks in January. Perfect timing.

But if you’re done with your Spring course, you have 2 choices:  sell the books in May or in August.

It’s harder to sell in May because not many students take summer courses. Thus, not a lot of potential buyers. You may have to wait a while.

But that’s not to say that you can’t sell in May. If you list the book early (like right after your final exam), you can still sell it before the summer begins.

Can’t sell it right away? Just list your books anyway. If there’s any potential customer, your book will be available for sale.

Check your emails regularly so you can prepare to ship your books.

88. Did You Know These 4 Things Before Selling Your Used Textbooks On Half.com?

If you are planning to sell your used textbooks on Half.com, check these 4 things first.

1. Your Personal Information

• Make sure your name is correct
• Remember your log-in information
• Yes, they are basic things but I’m sure you have registered tons of other sites. You may forget what user name or password you use on Half.com

2. Seller Payment Method

You want to get paid for your books, don’t you? Then make sure the bank information is up to date. Get your check ready, you will need your routing number and account number.

If your bank account is incorrect, the money will return to your Half.com. You will receive notification to update the information but the payment will be delayed. Who really wants delayed payment?

3. Shipping Options

You’re a seller. Specify what shipping method you will use and where you are willing to ship your textbooks.

Answer the following 3 questions:

• Do you ship Media only? or Media and Expedited?
• Where do you ship your textbooks from? (Update this regularly if you move because different location have different buyers)
• Do you ship to Hawaii, Alaska, or PO box (PO box is a bit risky. Your items may be lost)

4. Vacations Settings

If you know you can’t ship your books, set your account ON VACATION. The buyer won’t be able to see or buy your books. You have nothing to worry about.

Once you return from your little trip, just log in and RETURN FROM VACATION.

89. Do You Know This Quick Way To Write An Effective Comment When Selling Your Used Textbooks On Half.com?

When listing your used textbooks on Half.com, comments are important only second to the price.  Potential buyer read the comment to decide whether to click the “BUY” button.

So use the comment to your advantage.

There’s only 1 rule to write an effective comment: Use short sentences.

You don’t need correct grammar or complete sentences. You don’t have space for all of this.

Take a look at these examples, see which seller you are more likely to buy from:

A: This book is great. I used it this semester and it’s very helpful. There are some writings in the later chapter…

Your message is cut short. There’s lots of redundancy and not a lot of information a buyer is interested in.

Now, read this comment.

B: Excellent Binder. Clean Page. Great Bargain. Standard Shipping to 48 US states only.

OR

B: EXCELLENT BINDER. CLEAN PAGE. GREAT BARGAIN. STANDARD SHIPPING TO 48 US STATES ONLY.

Short but straight to the point. There’s lot of important information here.

• Book looks good
• Cheap price
• Not ship to Alaska and Hawaii

See? Use short sentence to convey important information so a potential buyer can make a decision right away.

90. How To Make Your Used Textbook Standout When Selling on Half.com?

Grab any book to search on Half.com. How many of your book is available on Half.com? A lot.

Take a look at the front page. Notice there are 5 sections for each condition? There are only 4-5 books with the lowest price are listed. Look at the comments? See any comment standout?

The only thing that will grab your attention right away: CAPITALIZED WORDS.

If you’re in a restaurant and someone screams, where would you look? The screamer (or the direction the screaming came from).

Take a look at other listings, if they are not capitalized, capitalize your comments. If all of the comments are capitalized, then don’t.

Do something different to grab potential buyer’s attention right away and you will sell much faster.

91. Do You Know These 7 Mistakes When Selling Used College Textbooks on Half.com?

1. List Under A Wrong Textbook

This is important. Got your used college textbooks? Search it using the ISBN number. ISBN number is the only way to find the right book fast.

2. List Under The Wrong Edition

If you search using Author, Title, or Publisher, you will have to search for the right edition. So using ISBN number will eliminate this problem for you. Different edition has different price.

3. Lie About The Book’s Conditions

When selling your used textbooks on Half.com, you have to describe the books’ condition to your buyers. If your textbook is old and has writings. Say it so. Don’t say it’s Brand New. Your buyer will know the difference when he receives it. The buyer will leave a negative feedback and your chance of selling your second textbook is tiny.

4. Set the wrong price

Before setting the price, take a look at the price range the buyers are willing to pay. If you want to sell fast, stay in the lower range. If you want more profit and don’t mind waiting, stay in the higher range.

5. Too Lazy To Ship

You have about 3 days to ship your textbook. It will say in the email exactly what date. Check your email regularly when you have books listed for sale.  Once you ship the book, go back to your account and Mark As Shipped.  Half.com will notify your buyer.

6. Forget The Tracking Number When Shipping Your Book

If you use US postal service, ship your book and get a tracking number. You will pay a little extra for this but it will help you for 2 reasons:

• Provide the buyer with the tracking number so he (or she) can personally track the book
• If your buyer says he did not receive the book, you have your tracking number to prove that you did ship the book

7. Forget to leave feedback

Leave feedback for the buyer after you ship the book. This will remind the buyer to leave feedback for you. As a seller, feedback is very important. Buyers look at your feedback to decide whether to buy your books. Leave feedback to receive feedback. More positive feedback = more potential buyers and fast sell.

You know 7 mistakes to avoid. What are you waiting for? Don’t let old textbooks cram your space.

92. What Are The 6 Easy Steps To Sell Your Used College Textbooks On Half.com?

To get rid of your textbooks by selling them online, follow these 6 easy steps :

1. Log in your account

2. Type the ISBN number in the Search bar

3. Found it. Look to your upper right. See Sell My Copy? Click it

4. Complete

• Conditions : Brand New, Like New, Very Good, Good, and Acceptable
• Comments : Have anything else to say? Like International Edition, standard shipping to 48 state only, etc…
• Descriptions: Tell how your book looks like? Dog eared, minimal writings, clean page, excellent binder, etc..

5. Set the price – Look at the price range and set your price.  See the last price that the book was sold? Set your price near it to sell fast.

6. List your item – A click of a button

Important note before selling: Be honest with your descriptions so you will sell fast and get good feedback.

Now you wait.

When someone buys your used textbooks, Half.com will notify you via email. Sign in your accont to check if you have the correct email.  Pack it, ship it, and wait for the money. Half.com will pay you on the 15th and the 30th of the month depending on when the buyer pays.

Once you sell your first textbook online, selling your second one is much easier. Don’t let the bookstore rob you. Start selling on Half.com.

RENT AND TRADE TO SAVE ON YOUR COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS

93. Why Not Try To Rent Your Textbooks At BookRenter.com?

Bookrenter.com is another site that let you rent your college textbooks at a cheaper price than buying at the bookstore.

4 things you want to know about Bookrenter.com:

1. The site is founded in 2004 to help you from wasting your money at the bookstore.

You can at least cut your textbook’s expense in half. More than 1 millions titles are available. So if you’re are taking a general class, your textbook should be available for rent.

2. You Can Rent Your Books For Different Period Of Time.

* 30 days

* 45 days

* 60 days

* 90 days

* 120 days

Like everything else, the shorter the rental period, the less money you have to pay.

If you want more time, request an extension and pay a little extra fee.

3. You Can Get High Quality Textbooks.

Often they send out new or like new condition. You can also choose to rent used copies if you want. Keep in mind that you need to keep your books exactly the same condition as you received them.

That means no writing, no highlighting, and no damage whatsoever on your books.

They will not accept your books back if any of the above happens to the books. So be careful.

4. You Can Ship Your Book Back Free .

When you’re done with your books you can send them back with pre-paid shipping label. Just print it out, slap it on the box, and drop at the UPS. You’re done.

So don’t worry if you have rented a heavy book, you don’t need to pay one cent out of your pocket to drag that book back to Bookrenter.com

So is it worth trying? Try to rent one book next semester and see if it helps you save some money.

94. What Are The 5 Advantages Of Downloadable E-Textbooks?

If you are tired of traditional paperback textbooks, do you know that downloadable E-textbooks are available now.

One of the popular company for this service is CourseSmart.com

This is a company owned by 5 publishers that allow you to purchase and download e-textbooks at a lower cost.

5 advantages of Course Smart:

1. E-books are cheaper

Downloadable e-textbooks are 50% cheaper than traditional textbooks.

You don’t have to pay for shipping and don’t have to wait for it. You can view your book in seconds after paying for it.

No more catching up in class because you have to wait for your textbooks.

2. E-books are lighter

It weighs nothing if you only use it on the computer. You can view your books any time as long as there is a computer. You don’t have to drag your books back and forth from your classes.

3. You control what you view

You can highlight or print out any portion of the textbook you want.

If you want to do a group study, just print out the relevant homework problems and bring it to your meeting.

You want to better prepared for your tests by inserting relevant portion of the textbooks in your notes.

4. You don’t worry about reselling your books

Since it’s an e-textbook, you don’t have to worry about reselling. Once you’re done with the final, you’re finished with the course. No more useless textbooks lying around in your dorm. More space for you.

5. You have a wide range of selection

Course Smart currently have more than 6000 titles available in more than 900 courses in more than 100 areas of study. If your course is popular, an e-book for your course may be available for you.

95. Have You Ever Thought Of Renting Your Textbooks To Cut Cost On Your College Expenses?

Have you?

If you have,  you can rent your books at Chegg.com

Chegg becomes a popular place for college students like you to rent textbooks for a fraction of the cost, use it for a full semester, and then return them.

5 advantages of renting your books from Chegg:

1. You Can Choose How Long You Want To Rent Your Books

There are 3 options for you:

• Semester -125 days
• Quarter -85 days
• Summer -60 days

2. You Can Request An Extension

If you need the book a little bit longer, you can request an extension and pay a little extra fee.

2 extensions choices:

• 15 days
• 30 days

3. You Can Have Highlight On The Book

You are renting the book so you should take care of it. Heavy writings is not allowed but minimal highlight may be permitted. But to be sure, don’t highlight at all. Why need highlight when you can summarize it in 2-3 sentences. Also, you would not remember where you highlighted anyway.

4. You Can Purchase The Book If You Want

If you like the book you rent, you can purchase that book for your own use. How much do you have pay? The full price – the rental fee that you paid. Just want to let you know that you have this option.

5. You Ship Your Textbook Back To Chegg For Free

You will get a shipping label to ship your books back for free. You are already paying rental fee out of your limit budget, it’s not fair if you have to pay shipping back too.

Have you looked at the size of your textbooks lately? It will cost a fortune to ship those heavy textbooks back to Chegg.com

96. What Are The Top Problems When You Rent Your College Textbooks At Chegg.com?

Chegg.com to textbooks is like Netflix to movies. See the analogy?

You rent your college textbooks, use them for a full semester, and return them back with free shipping.

You save money on books. They plant a tree for every book you rent. Very cost effective and environmental friendly.

But Chegg.com is not without problems.

The top problem when renting your books at Chegg:

It takes a long time to get a response

Although some students have nice experience with Chegg, other may disagree.

There are 2 ways you can contact Chegg

• Phone
• Email

However, it seems that Chegg takes quite a while to response to its customers. Well, with only 40 full-time employees and 40 part-time employees to deal with more than 2 million books, it’s an uneven balance. But this can’t be an excuse.

So far delay to response is the biggest problem when renting your textbooks at Chegg

Confusion and problems in communication often arise when you rent multiple books at the same time.

So if possible, rent only the most expensive book you can’t afford to buy. For other cheaper books, search for used copies on Half.com or Amazon to buy and then resell them later.

97. Should You Buy Or Rent Your College Textbooks?

So should you buy or rent your college textbooks?

Do you mean to ask which will save you more money: Buy OR Rent?

It depends on the type of textbooks you need.

If you need 4 textbooks for 4 courses and 1 of them is super expensive. You search for days but can’t find a cheaper copy.

Rent it. You can save at least 50% -75% off the full price.

2 places you can rent your books:

• Chegg.com
• Book Renter.com

For other books, if you can find better deals online, buy used copies.

Why?

Because you can do whatever you want if you own the books.

Renting your textbooks can save you lots of money. But it has its disadvantages.

• You can’t write on it  (for a few course, it’s hard not to do that)
• You have to keep in mind the rental deadline ( you need to clear up some space in your brain for that final, you don’t need this)
• You have to remember to ship them back (your brain is kind of shut down after the finals, sometimes you have no energy to do anything else)
• You need to call them back to make sure that they receive the books (one more thing to keep in mind)

So to avoid having to do so many things after the dreadful finals, rent only the most expensive book. For other books, try to obtain the cheapest copies. Then you can do whatever you want with them.

98. Do You Know This 1 New Tool For You To Trade Textbooks Directly With Your College Mates To Save Money On Textbooks?

Have you ever heard of  Campustextbookswap.com ?

Doubt it because it’s not popular yet. But you should because this service can help you save money on your textbooks.

Campustextbookswap.com helps you swap textbooks with your college mates directly.

What do you do ?

Simple.

• Register an account
• Log in into your college
• Post an announcement of which books you want to sell or search which books you want to buy
• Set up your meeting with the seller or buyer
• Control the transaction yourself

This is a neat idea.

If you are a seller, you have 2 advantages:

• No commission for the middle man
• No packing your books since you meet the buyer directly

If you are a buyer, you have 3 advantages:

• No waiting for delay shipping
• No shipping charge since you meet the seller directly
• Be able to buy rare books that are specific to your campus

But since you control your transactions, you have to make sure:

• Meeting at a safe place
• Receiving good quality books

Campustextbookswap.com is not popular yet since many college students like you don’t know about it.

But now you do. Check to see if any student on your campus is participating in the book swap. If not, consider starting a campaign on your campus so your college mates can trade books with one another.

DONATE YOUR USED COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS

99. Would You Like To Donate Your Used Textbooks To Prisoners?

If you have used textbooks and would like to donate, would you like to give them to prisoners?

Yes?

Please donate your used textbooks through Books Through Bars organization.

What Is Books Through Bars?

• Founded in late 1980s
• Provide free books to prisoners (for reading and preparing for GED exams so they can rebuild their lives)
• Provide more than 8000 book-packages to prisoners
• Have more than 300 volunteers

How Can You Donate Your Used Textbooks?

• You can search for a Books Through Bars program near you. There are many location in US East Coast. So if you live in NY, PA, NJ,CT, etc..there will be a location in your state.
• To find a location near you
• If you want to donate a small amount of money to help them offset the increase in postage cost, you can too.

Would You Like To Contact Books Through Bars?

Books Through Bars
4722 Baltimore Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19143
Phone: (215) 727-8170
E-mail: info@booksthroughbars.org

Can’t find the information you need here, search Books Through Bars organization.

Donate your books if you can. Don’t let them end up in the trash. There are many more places you can donate your books. Stay tuned.

100. Would You Like To Donate Your Used Textbooks To GoodWill?

If you would like to donate your textbooks, check out Goodwill.org

GoodWill is well known for accepting clothing donations. However, they also accept books donations as well.

If you want to find a GoodWill location near you, search Goodwill locations.

If you want to contact GoodWill to ask more about how to donate your used textbooks:

Goodwill Industries International
15810 Indianola Drive

Rockville, MD 20855

Phone: 1-800-741-0186

Email: contactus@goodwill.org

Want to find out what other services GoodWill provide? Search Goodwill official site.

101. What Types Of Student Buying Their Textbooks At The Bookstore?

3 types of students:

1. College Freshman

Remember those time?

Bookstores love college freshman. So naive and full of hope.

Charge them full-price and they still happily walk out of the store. A nice profit and a happy customer.

Wait until they wise up and know that they can get their cheap textbooks on Half or Amazon at 70% off. Then the bookstore will turn to another mistress – new college freshmen (haha!).

2. Rich Students

They don’t care. If they need something, they buy. Money is not an issue (to those who have it).

3. “Convenience” Lover

These students just love the convenience of the bookstore. They don’t mind paying more for textbooks.

They have good health. They can still work and pay for those textbooks.

So do you buy your textbooks at the bookstore? What type of student are you?

102. Would Your Like To Recycle Your Used College Textbooks To Help The Environment?

So, what is textbook recycle?

2 meanings:

1. Put in the recycle bin next to your trash cans

2. Donate your books so they can be put back into circulation

For the 1st option, just put your textbook into your recycle bin. Check with your local waste office to how they will collect the recycled stuffs.

Now the the 2nd options. There are many places you can donate your books.

Different organizations will donate the money they make from selling your books to different charity causes.

If you love the environment, here’s a place you can donate your textbooks.

Greentextbooks.org

They always accept book donations. Part of the money from the sale will support The Arbor Day Foundation.

When you donate your used textbooks, Greentextbooks.org will make a contribution on your behalf to The Arbor Day Foundation.  Feeling good, isn’t it?

Have you heard of this organization?

Most likely. Their mission is to keep our environment green by planting more trees.

If you are pro-green, you will love this organization.

Want to contact Greentextbooks.org to know how you can donate your textbooks?

2 ways.

Email: info@greentextbooks.org

Mail:

GreenTextbooks.org

1412 Plata Way

Sandy, UT 84093

103. Do You Want To Donate, Resell, Or Host A Book Drive On Your Campus For A Good Cause?

If you go on Half.com, you will often see  good textbooks with the lowest price from Betterworldbooks.com. I have bought a few myself over the years.

You are a college student. You can’t afford large monetary contribution. But you can still help.

How?

3 ways.

• Donate your used textbooks
• Resell your used textbooks
• Host a book-drive to raise funds for your organization

Before you do, here are some information you want to know:

Who is Betterworldbooks.com?

• A company that sells books and donates money to fund literacy projects in the US and the world
• Network with 16000 campuses and 1000 libraries across the nation to collect used textbooks
• It has collected more than 11 million books and raised 4.5 millions dollars in education funding
• It has donated 1 million books to non- profit organizations: Room to read, Invisible Children, Family Literacy, Books For Africa, and World Fund.

What books do they accept?

• College textbooks
• Study guides
• Workbooks
• Fiction/non-fiction (hardcover)
• Travel books

Books must be clean.

How Do You Donate Your Textbooks?

You can ship your textbooks to :

BETTER WORLD BOOKS
Attn: First Book
55740 Currant Road
Mishawaka, IN 46545

If you want to ask Better World Books how to pack your book donations correctly, please email your questions to help@BetterWorldBooks.com

Do You Want To Raise Fund For Your Favorite Charity Organization?

If you are running a charity or want to raise funds for your fraternity, sorority, or club, you can host a book-drive on campus.

By the end of the semester, some books can’t be sold back to the bookstore. Collect them and send them to Betterworldbooks.com they will pay you or organization money. A Practical idea.

If you need help hosting a book drive, search Betterworldbooks bookdrive to find out more.

What If You Only Want To Resell Your textbooks?

Betterworldbooks.com will do that. Search Betterworldbooks resell to see how much Better World Book will pay for your used textbooks.

How do you feel now, are you ready to donate your books?

104. If You Live In California, Would You Like To Donate Your Used College Textbooks?

If you live in California, you can donate your used textbooks to The Global Book Exchange Organization.

This organization has stopped accepting book donations by mail in the mean time.  So you may have to drop off your used textbooks.

Here are some information you need to know:

What’s Global Book Exchange?

• Non-profit organization
• Founded 1987
• Operate by volunteers
• Accept used or new books to redistribute to schools and overseas
• Redistribute more than 2 millions books

How Do You Prepare Your Books For Donations?

• Make sure your books are acceptable (excellent binder, clean page, acceptable condition)
• Donate fewer than 4 boxes. If more than 4 boxes, you have to schedule an appointment. But I think you will need only 1 box.
• Pack your books tightly so the box can be stacked up
• Pack in small box

Where Can You Drop Off Your Used College Textbooks?

852 Del Ganado

San Rafael, CA 94903

When Can You Come And Drop Off Your Books?

Thursdays 1:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Saturdays 1:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m

How Do You Contact The Global Book Exchange Director?

Send an email to Marilyn at booksforstudents@aol.com

If you want to verify information or find out more about this organization, search for The Global Book Exchange Organization.

105. Do You Know These 4 Things When Donating Your Used College Textbooks?

You have used textbooks and you want to donate them. Good for you. But you want to know these 4 things before donating so your books

1. Donate The Right Kind Of Books

Different organizations accept different kinds of books. Some accepts any kind of books. Others only accept books that are no more than 10 years old.

They are selective in accepting donations because they have different kind of recipients. They just want to deliver the right books to the right students.

2. Prepare Your Book Donations

Some organizations have collection bins across campuses for you to drop-off your unwanted textbooks.

But if you want to donate many books, put them in a small box and tape it. Often, box should weighs 40 lbs or less. It’s easy for you to pack and carry to the drop-off locations.

3. Check If The Organization Is Non- Profit

There are a several non-profit organizations and a few recycling companies that collect used textbooks. You can choose to donate your used textbooks to any organization you want.

Non-profit textbooks collectors:

• The Hands Across Water program
• Books for Africa program

Recycling textbook company

• Textbooks Recycle

4. Tax Deductible For Your Textbooks Donations

What’s Tax Deductible Contributions? That means contributions that lowers your taxable income = lower tax.

If you donate a lot of your textbooks to non-profit organization and you want your contributions to be tax-deductible, do these 3 things:

1. Check to see if the organization has 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. It means they are non-profit

2. Ask for the form that put a value on your donations

3. Value your donations – be as accurate as you can

4. Ask if they can send you a letter confirming the value

Search for Tax Receipt form of The Hands Across Water if you would like to donate your textbooks to this organization and want your donations to be tax-deductible.

106. Do You Want To Donate Your Used College Text Books If You Are In One Of These States?

Do you want to donate your used textbooks?

Are you in one of these states?

• Massachusetts
• Connecticut
• Rhode Island
• Missouri
• Washington
• Georgia

Yes?  The Hands Across Water organization have collection bins across campuses to collect used textbooks.

3 things you want to know.

1. What Books  The Hands Across Water ACCEPT?

• Fiction and non fiction
• Books of any age
• College textbooks
• DVDs

2.What Books The Hands Across Water DON’T ACCEPT?

• Magazines
• Phone directories
• Encyclopedia
• Books with mold on them

3. How To Donate Books?

2 kinds of containers:

• Drop Slot container- Put one book at a time
• Walk In containers- Place all book tightly in a box with lids and tape it. Use small box.

4. How To Contact The Hands Across Water?

Jane Miller Webber, Director
7 Rodgers Road
Stoneham, MA 02180-3045
literacyforall@yahoo.com 781.438.4051

107. How To Donate Your Used Textbooks To Help Children In Africa?

See Books For Africa organization? Don’t have time to browse the site? Want to know how to donate your used textbooks to help children in Africa.

4 things you want to know.

1. What textbooks DO Books For Africa accept?

• Fiction and Non-fiction – no more than 10 years old
• College Textbooks – no more than 10 years old
• Encyclopedia and Dictionaries – after 1995
• Medical and Law Textbooks – no more than 10 years old
• Bibles
• Maps

2. What books DON’T Books For Africa accept?

• Magazines
• Music Books
• History books

3.  Where Can You MAIL Your Used Textbooks?

If your used textbooks are under 450 pounds you can just mail them. The address is:

Books For Africa Warehouse-Atlanta
2971 Olympic Industrial Drive SE, Suite C
Smyrna, GA 30080   US

4. How To Contact Books For Africa

253 East 4th Street, Suite 200
Saint Paul, MN 55101 USA
Phone: 651-602-9844
Fax: 651-602-9848
E-mail: bfa@booksforafrica.org

Don’t let your unused textbooks go to waste, donate them.

Start with Books For Africa.

108. Have You Heard Of This 4 Places To Donate Your Used Textbooks If You Can’t Sell Them Online?

You’re in college. You have textbooks that you haven’t used in ages. Don’t let them cram up your space. What do you do?

Donate them. Do some good. Clear your space for new textbooks.

Here are 4 places you can donate your used textbooks:

1. Books For Africa

Organization has base in Minnesota. BFA has shipped more than 20 millions books to 45 countries in Africa since 1988.

2. The Hands Across The Water

Non-profit organization has base in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Georgia, and Washington states.  It has provided more than 5 millions books to Haiti, India, the Philippines, Ghana, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Malawi, and South Africa.

3. Textbooks Recycle

A New York company that collects unused and unwanted textbooks and distributes it around US and around the world. The company has been operating for 5 years.

4.  Green Textbooks

A supporter of Arbor Day Foundation that help to prevent textbooks from ending up in a landfill.

That’s it for now. 4 places for your used textbooks to do some good.

Keep in mind, 3 very good things come from this:

1. Provide books for those who need them- your unwanted book is someone’s else opportunity to learn
2. Help the environment by recycling them – less tree got cut down to produce paper
3. Clear up your space – you have more room- what more do you want?

109. Would You Rather Prefer Print On Demand Textbooks?

To fight against the stupid rise of textbook cost, college students and caring professors have been pushing Open Textbook Statement of Intent campaign. The goal of this campaign is to make textbooks available for free or for a much lower cost.

That’s a campaign but this is the action: Flat World Knowledge

4 advantages of this service:

1. It’s free to use if you view your textbooks online
2. If you want paper back version, you can order black and white or color version to save money
3. Your professor can edit, mix, and match different textbooks depending on what he wants to teach in the course
4. You can purchase additional resources like flash card, quizzes, and problem guide if you want

If this service becomes popular, you can save tons of money on your college textbooks. Also you will be more engaged in your classes since your lectures will closely follow your textbooks.

You will have control over what you spend on your textbooks: free or at a much lower cost.

You don’t have to use the same boring materials because your professor can select articles from different authors with different styles of writing.

3 good things for you:

• You save money
• You enjoy your course better -  that means getting some value out of your tuition money
• You don’t have to resell your book if you use it online for free. Done when you’re done.

COLLEGE TEXTBOOKS CAMPAIGNS

110. Why Not Join This Good Cause If You Have Been Ripped Off On Your College Textbooks?

Have you ever been ripped off by your bookstore for your college textbooks?

Not sure?

Ok. Answer 2 questions:

• Have you ever been upset because you believe you paid too much for your textbooks?

• Have you ever been walking out from a buy-back program with a few dollars on books that costs you hundreds to buy?

Yes to either question means you have been ripped off once too many times.

Make Textbooks Affordable program has started a campaign to fight back the unnecessary rise of textbooks costs.

The campaign supports the use of Open Textbooks program. In this program, you are able to view your textbooks online. If you want a paperback version, you can print them at a much cheaper price.

2000 professors across the nation have signed the statement to support the use of Open Textbooks program.

Ask your professor if he (or she) is willing to join this good cause to help college students across America get rid of the outrageous textbooks cost.

111.  Get Rid of Outrageous Textbook Cost Once and For All

Are you a college student? Did you pay 750$ or even 1000$ for your textbooks last semester?  Were you able to sell back your books? How much?  Pennies on the dollar?

One solution to get rid of outrageous textbook cost once and for all: buy used textbooks.

But NOT just any used textbooks. Used textbooks at your bookstore cost as much as the new versions.  Thus, you want to buy used textbooks with the “used” price. One place that has worked wonders for tight-budgeted college students is the almighty: Half.com

Heard of Half.com but never try it out? You are wasting a lot of precious money on textbooks that you shouldn’t have. May be you wanted to try but just don’t know where to start. Apply what you learn here and you are well on your way to a bag of  hefty extra cash next semester. By then, you can finally afford to eat something other than instant noodles and Mcdonalds (sigh).