sites for sales, student discounts on texts & other stuff

[deeyana]

I was watching CNN yesterday and there was some talk about www.chegg.com/rent/ . It's a fairly new site where collage students can rent text books for cheap or sell their their own text books. Just wanted to pass the info along.

[sisdparent]

We tried them out based on a referral from another parent for daughter number two. It was a disaster. The books (correctly addressed) floated around for several days and ended up back at the shipping point. Today, we finally discovered that they had shipped them on UPS, instead of USPS as we had requested (all of the girls' mail has to go to the PO Boxes at school) and the PO Box # was clearly printed on the receipt and shipping tags. They offered to reship, but that would still be another 10 days at least. So we ended up getting a refund.

I ended up calling the University Bookstore and talked them into letting me pay for texts over the phone. The only reason they let me was that I was the 5th parent who had called today for the exact same reason. The real downside is that she had to buy new books, no used ones are available at this point in the semester.

So, my verdict is if you have time to order and have them shipped to your home before your kids leave for school, they're probably okay. However, I would not trust them to deliver to your kids at school or too close to the start of classes.

[healthy11]

I've had very good luck buying used books for my son from www.textbooks.com ;
most look "like new." They offer textbooks for rent, but we haven't done that yet. Their shipping is via UPS and generally free for orders over $25 (virtually every college text), and their return policy has been hassle-free.

Here are some other book sites that some articles recently mentioned:
www.bestbookbuys.com,
www.bookrenter.com,
www.campusbooks.com,
www.campusbookrentals.com,
www.coursesmart.com,
www.half.com
www.ichapters.com,
www.opentextbooks.org,
www.swapsimple.com,
www.skoobit.com,
and of course www.amazon.com
GetTextbooks.com
www.thriftbooks.com
www.abebooks.com and
www.saveontextbooks.net are great sites to compare pricing

For discounts in general, check Amazon, Groupon, Slickdeals, and Daily Steals for everyday items that are reduced-price.

[healthy11]

It's that "time of year" when this information can be handy, so I'm "bumping" it to the top.

[majorv]

My daughter used chegg last year for one of her textbooks. Yes, as long as you don't wait until the last minute to order your textbook it shouldn't be a problem. There was a glitch in trying to print the return shipping label to return the book but a call to customer service took care of that. I think she would use them again.

[healthy11]

While trying to figure out the best place to buy my son's textbooks, I noticed that several of the sites would also do "book buybacks" even if you didn't purchase a textbook from them originally (but if you did, they'd often give you 10% premium on the buyback amount.) It made me decide to look though the past couple of years of books that were sitting on my son's shelf. While he might still use a few for reference at his new school, I know many will never be opened again (and frankly, I'm not sure he read them in the first place....few, if any, had any highlighting or other notes in them.)
When all was said and done, I gathered up a dozen old books (including his old high school AP physics text) and sold them on www.half.com for over $700; the AP book went for $110 alone! I'm disappointed that a few books only went for $20, because there are newer editions now available, but still, it was nice to get some money back. I know e-books often cost less than hardcovers to begin with, but this way it's our choice which to keep; otherwise, I'm pretty sure we'd have to pay a new fee to use the e-book for another semester (like if a student were to retake a class, or even just use it as a reference in a subsequent course.)

[majorv]

Textbook publishers have got to be rich! For a 5 week Lit class my daughter ended up having to buy a $115 textbook. The teacher apologized, saying it was a department decision. She told the class they could get the assigned stories/poems in other ways to try and avoid buying it. By the third day, though, we realized it would be too hard to find them and stay up with the assignments, so I told her to buy it. Class just finished and I am tasked with trying to sell it. I looked on half.com, amazon and textbooks.com, and we can only get $37 for it, grrr! We can't even sell her sociology book because a new edition came out.

[bros]

www.chegg.com is good for renting books

[mamak]

My daughter purchased all her books used and saved hundreds... I was impressed. She used various websites and had no problems at all. We also did this back when she was in high school and took a CC course that required a $120.00 book/dvd which we found for $35.00 and she sold it for $39.00.

Some of her books for this semester were posted early and some were just posted last week. Grand total for all of them was less than $100.00

[mamak]

Thanks for the additional resources. We used textbooks.com and amazon.

[healthy11]

Mamak, spending under $100/semester for books is unbelievable! It must be due to your daughter's major, because in engineering my son is routinely spending over $100 for EACH USED textbook, although his "gen ed" books are usually less.

[bros]

Aug 26, 2010 8:23:36 GMT -5 healthy11 said:

Mamak, spending under $100/semester for books is unbelievable! It must be due to your daughter's major, because in engineering my son is routinely spending over $100 for EACH USED textbook, although his "gen ed" books are usually less.

My brother's books would've been $600+ this semester, but he rented the art history books (which cost $310 on their own)

My books are currently $456.95 and one course doesn't have books posted yet

[healthy11]

mamak posted this in another thread, and I thought it might be of interest here, too:
www.biblio.com/
I found new and used CD's of my son's high school text books for much cheaper than its worth in effort trying to get the school to provide ($1.00 $6.00).....perhaps a good resource for those who's schools do not want to provide. My son had these in middle school which he found more useful than the online versions because they loaded faster. I think they also had college texts as well.

[zippity]

www.abebooks.com has consistently had cheap books for my son's private school and his tech is Electrical Engineering. Recently
www.bookcircus.com had what we needed for 50% off
I'm with mamak's daughter, we buy from several sites. Last year our daughter's school had us use, myschoolbookstore.com and I bit the bullet because frankly it was a last minute court win that got her in the school and we had to act fast. For the $300 we spent we got back $120 in credit. I always buy the books rated almost lowest if I can help it.

[suej]

Check the possibility of ebooks, too.

[healthy11]

For this semester, we got one of my son's books from www.valorebooks.com ~ it's a 2010 edition text, so there weren't many "used" ones available anywhere. It's an "international version" softcover book, but was only 1/3 the price of the hardcover from his university bookstore, and my son has found that the contents of international edition books are virtually identical.

Suej, how do they handle licensing agreements on ebooks? If a student expects to use a text as a reference in later courses, or if they end up dropping a course or repeating a class in another semester, do they have to pay again for access to it? I know that used to be a limitation of not having actual texts.

[bros]

Jan 5, 2011 15:39:22 GMT -5 healthy11 said:

For this semester, we got one of my son's books from www.valorebooks.com ~ it's a 2010 edition text, so there weren't many "used" ones available anywhere. It's an "international version" softcover book, but was only 1/3 the price of the hardcover from his university bookstore, and my son has found that the contents of international edition books are virtually identical.

Suej, how do they handle licensing agreements on ebooks? If a student expects to use a text as a reference in later courses, or if they end up dropping a course or repeating a class in another semester, do they have to pay again for access to it? I know that used to be a limitation of not having actual texts.

For ebooks directly from the college bookstore, it has a license that expires after the course ends.

[healthy11]

bros, would the college bookstore give a student a refund on the ebook if they dropped the class early in the semester, like many bookstores do with a hardcover text?

[healthy11]

Thanks to jisp for the following:

"My dad, a university professor, just sent this to me and all the college age grandchildren. I thought you guys might find it useful as well. In case you don't know about it the following web site allows you to download (for free) many text books. If you need help using this let me know.

library.nu/

You need to have a gmail account and you need to register.
For some books you need to instal djvu (free download). Others
are in pdf. The downloads need to be unzipped."

[healthy11]

Here is a website that offers free video "tutorials" on a variety of college level subject matter (some H.S. topics as well) with a particularly large collection of MATH & SCIENCE SUBJECTS:
www.khanacademy.org/#browse

[Mayleng]

By the way, how and when are the kids told what books is required?

[momfromma]

ds usually emails his teachers asking what books they use as soon as he selects his classes. Some answer pretty much immediately, others wait until school ends. But he has had most of his books for a while (though there is always a holdout that gives his books on the first day of school).

[healthy11]

Mayleng, at most colleges, there's a link to the campus bookstore where kids can enter their class schedule and see what books are required for each course. In most cases, all sections of the class will use the same materials, HOWEVER you might find one or two profs who have their own book list, or they "recommend" supplemental texts (which I would NOT buy until your son actually gets into the class and sees if he needs it.)

Sometimes teachers aren't concerned about the students having "the latest" edition of a book, which is great because usually they can be found online for lower cost. Most campus bookstores will sell "used" editions of hardcover textbooks at 75% of the new price, and they'll "buyback" gently used books at the end of each semester for 50%, so long as the professors say they'll be using the same texts the following term. You need to buy early for best selection of "used" books. My son has found that many of his engineering courses use texts where "International Editions" are available, which are generally cheaper because they're softcover and don't have the same licensing fees. Campus bookstores and sites like half.com won't let you resell International Editions of books, but my son is keeping most of them for reference, anyway.

I think one of the major problem with getting electronic books is how long you're allowed to "keep" them. If a student re-takes a class, do you have to pay again for the e-text? If it's used in their major, they might want to retain them for long-term reference.

[Mayleng]

Thanks healthy.

[momfromma]

chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/as-textbook-formats-multiply-new-services-help-students-compare-options/32934

Here is an interesting article about services to compare textbooks prices.

[healthy11]

Momfromma, in the article you posted, I was surprised to read that some campuses are promoting the 'comparison shopping" from their own bookstores...my son's first college wouldn't even put ISBN numbers online, in an effort to discourage students from buying their books elsewhere. His current college does list ISBN's, but some professors still list "unique" texts that are even tailored to that specific University. (Last semester, my son had a statistics course which required such a book, but we lucked out and found someone on ebay who was selling it used!)

[caniacfan]

We used chegg.com this year and it was fine. They had all my dd's books either new, used or to rent. We got them used (because she does well writing notes in books). They were delivered within a few days of us ordering them. One book ended up not being available but they sent an email out immediately apologizing and giving us a coupon for 15% off her next purchase. We ended up having to buy that particular book through her college bookstore - again delivery was quick but it was a tad more expensive. We got all her ISBN #s and were also able to compare. Amazon looked pretty good too but the chegg prices were better.

[empeg1]

Check out your college bookstore for the policy re used books. At the U of Oregon, students who buy used books can sell them back to the bookstore for 80% of the price of a new book. This is a great deal!

[healthy11]

empeg. 80% is phenomenal; I've NEVER heard of any other college offering that much back. Your daughter really does sound like she's in a unique school!

[bros]

Also, I assume you guys know about Amazon Student?

www.amazon.com/gp/student/signup/info

For anyone with a .edu email, they get amazon prime free for 6 months (free 2 day shipping and 1-day shipping is only $3.99 per item, regardless of size