<p>Hello. My S is about to enter his 2nd semester of his freshmen year. Way back in August we purchased all of his books at the college bookstore which happens to be a Barnes and Noble store. Being new to this whole process we thought at the time that purchasing them there would ensure that we got all the correct ones. Now that reality has set in I am looking for other options in buying books for next semester and more importantly to save some money. So far I find Amazon.com to be the best in both pricing and quality of books available. I have purchased many items from Amazon before so I am comfortable in using them for this. I have also visted some of the other sites out there like textbooks.com and half.com. Does anyone else have any suggestions or sucess stories they can share? I appreciate any input. Have a great New Year.</p>
<p>My kids buy as many of their books as they can..used...online. The only time they buy from the bookstore is when the school is using a brand new edition of the book and there is no other choice. They have had great success. HOWEVER do not have the books shipped book freight or whatever it's called these days. Have them shipped either priority mail or first class. It's worth the extra postage to have the books before the term ends:)</p>
<p>I often used [url=<a href="http://www.bigwords.com%5DBigwords%5B/url">http://www.bigwords.com]Bigwords[/url</a>], which is a textbook search engine -- you can enter all of your books, and it will tell you which site has the best price for each book, and which site has the best price for all books together.</p>
<p>I did tend to find that Amazon had the best prices, and I sold several books back there myself.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.textbooksrus%5B/url%5D">www.textbooksrus</a> will give you comparisons of prices, will allow you to print a label to ship back books you are selling and is often good for buying them. If buying online it is important to make sure you have the ISBN of the book the prof specifies. There have been lots of threads about this. Some bookstores make it hard to find the ISBN without going in and copying it from the book (some bookstores discourage this), others will give you that information online, you put in the course and prof, it pulls up the book and ISBN. Good luck.</p>
<p>My kids wait until the first class, because in some cases, not all the textbooks on the official list are used.</p>
<p>If you have the ISBN you can try AddALL</a> book search and price comparison & put in the ISBN. It will search the web for the least expensive book available including the shipping. I purchased all my textbooks using their site. Now my D uses it.</p>
<p>I buy from half.com and my books have all been at 1/2 or less of the selling price at the school bookstores. </p>
<p>Also, check out if your school has some kind of used book thing going on. I'm hoping to buy some books for next semester that way too.</p>
<p>I just tried looking for 5 books I think my son will need (final list for spring isn't out yet). Could only find 1 on any used book website and it was like $15 less than the school store.</p>
<p>I swear I think his school gets books published just for them</p>
<p>and my son wants to keep his first semester books. At least the $217 french books will be used for 2 semesters. Whatta bargain.</p>
<p>I did find 1 book for fall on the web for half price, but most I can't find at a discount at all :-( Almost $700 for fall semester, spring looks to be in the $400 range. UGH!</p>
<p>that is another situation we have. He wants to keep all the math, physics and chemistry books he used last semester, so I only have one book to be sold back. Last semesters bill was close to $500 and I am hoping to reduce that if possible. His school makes it very tough not use the Barnes and Noble bookstore there on campus and they do not supply the IBN number on their web site. Due to some searching we have been able to get what is needed to make sure the correct book is bought. Now I just have to find the best price. thanks again for the responses.</p>
<p>These kinds of threads make me that much happier that my school has a rental program. It costs me $18.33 per course to rent my textbooks for the semester. That means I had over $600 in textbooks last semester, and I paid $90. There was only one or maybe two of those books I would have wanted to keep anyway.</p>
<p>My freshman daughter is on quarters so we are in our 2nd quarter. First quarter, like you, bought all from the school run B and N store. Ordered online for 2nd quarter , Amazon, Half.com and Abebooks and saved SO much $$$$. We ordered all books in "new" or "like new" condition. Definitely pay the little bit extra for quicker shipping. We upgraded the shipping and had all the books within a week. We will definitely do this again...</p>
<p>Best tips (as given already)
Enter books into one of the sites that lets you compare...
Double triple check before you press "buy" to make sure the book is the condition, edition you want/need...
Pay for quicker shipping - you will still save a bundle!!!!</p>
<p>a $217 * french* book?</p>
<p>Now I expected my ds books to be expensive since she was a science major and lots of color plates and heavy paper- but why would a french book be so expensive?
Is dinner included?</p>
<p>Oh and be careful to get your books in the correct language. DS ordered a book and it was REALLY cheap. Good thing it didn't cost much. It was in Spanish (no it was not for a Spanish course) and he had to buy it a second time. AND no one wanted the Spanish version.</p>
<p>While trying to find the best deals last semester, we ordered one of S's books through Textbooks.com. We couldn't find it used anywhere, so went with new (a little reduced from sticker price) and their guaranteed buy back program. If the book is returned in good condition, they will return half of the original cost. Shipping was free and fast both ways. We are just waiting on receipt of the refund. We shipped it back and they have been very good in notifying us by email of the status (that they did receive it, that it is being processed). We only did the guaranteed buy back because we knew this was a book he would have no interest in keeping.</p>
<p>that french book had a cd or dvd and it's good for french 1 and french 2.</p>
<p>why aren't my son's books on these used book sites???</p>
<p>
[quote]
I swear I think his school gets books published just for them
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That literally happens. It's called custom publishing. My alma mater bookstore sells shrink-wrapped bundles of multiple books for some classes, and "special edition" books for others, both ordered by particular instructors at the college.</p>
<p>More and more profs are putting together coursepacks that consist of journal articles and excerpts from books. The college secures copyrights permissions, copies the articles and excerpts, puts them all together in a coursepacks and sells them to students, often through the college bookstore. This is much better than requiring students to purchase an expensive book in order to read one chapter or have them all fight to read the same journal article.</p>
<p>It drives me crazy that my S' bookstore basically makes it impossible to get the ISBN without physically going to the bookstore (and by that time, classes are usually only a few days away and it's impractical to buy online). It's not just the ISBN, either. The online information from the college bookstore usually doesn't even include edition number or year of publication. I know exactly why they do this, and it makes me mad -- they get enough of my money already.</p>
<p>sueinphilly: can you provide us with a couple of the ISBN numbers and let us try? I love a good challenge.</p>
<p>lderochi:</p>
<p>Does the course syllabus provide the edition information? In that case, it's easy to find out the ISBN number by going to Amazon.com or to the online library catalog.</p>
<p>By coincidence, we had this discussion over lunch with S and H. As a consumer, I would love the convenience of having the ISBN information. But if I were a bookstore manager, I see no point in making it easier for prospective consumers to buy elsewhere. Let me explain. A college bookstore must stock enough copies for all the courses offered by the college, even if only five students are expected to take the course. The bookstore asks profs to estimate the number of students who will take the course. Students are usually free to return books by a certain time. Unused books must be shipped back to the publisher. Storing, displaying, returning books all cost money. I actually don't know how much profit college bookstores make on textbooks (as opposed to non-textbook items).</p>