<p>Will 1st year students have time to order used books online if they find out what they need during O week? </p>
<p>Are they forced to buy new from the bookstore? </p>
<p>What are the better options for buying books outside of the bookstore?</p>
<p>What about renting?</p>
<p>1) Buy books on half.com.
2) While waiting, purchase books from Sem Coop or Bookstore.
3) Use said books for classes.
4) When books from half.com arrive, take books back to Sem Coop or Bookstore for full refund.
5) Profit! …or, umm, avoid getting ripped off!</p>
<p>^^ Or, you can try nabbing a copy from the Reg and return it, which feels a little more morally steady.</p>
<p>I thought that until I saw how much the Bookstore is trying to rip off students. Their prices are usually about 25-50% more than the price on Amazon. I have no sympathy for companies trying to rip students off.</p>
<p>However, I have never actually taken part in this. You can get most of the books used in your classes as an e-book online for free, through certain websites (PM me). I usually download these e-books and read them until my books arrive from used dealers.</p>
<p>There is another, more legally/morally sound solution. As I mentioned before, Amazon’s prices are usually significantly cheaper than the Bookstore’s. If you want a new copy, but don’t care to pay the Bookstore’s price, you might want to buy it on Amazon with free shipping. While you’re waiting, you can buy the e-book of the book you just bought for about $5-10 more. While you’re awaiting the arrival of the physical textbook, you can use this.</p>
<p>Mad props to Google Books, which saved me hundreds of dollars in giant texts used for a single chapter in odd electives. They don’t have everything, but were still incredibly useful.</p>
<p>You could also use it just while waiting for internet-ordered books to arrive, if other sources are less forthcoming.</p>
<p>Pay attention to purchasing books with intention to return to the university bookstores: they have very strict expiry dates on their return policies, and even if your book’s never been opened (still sealed in plastic wrap and all), they’ll buy it back after that date for at most 50% of what you paid… if that much… if at all. They’re completely ridiculous about it.</p>
<p>Amazon/half takes about a week.</p>
<p>Sometimes my kids have had to buy a book at Sem or Powell’s. Never a big text, more like the book they’re only using for the first 4 classes.</p>
<p>While they wait they use library reserve, online, or simply borrowing nicely from friends.</p>