A lot has changed about college since I attended the University of Puget Sound years ago. And while students today are much more digitally-focused – with e-mail, social networks, online news and more – the reality is most textbooks are not yet available as e-books. This means students will still need to search out and buy physical books in preparation for the start of a new term.
When I was in college, I either purchased the books new or used from the school bookstore or was lucky enough to buy books used from another student. At the end of the term, I was thrilled to sell my books back to the bookstore or to other students and pocket some extra cash. Today, students have a variety of ways to buy, or even rent their books online,
- Purchase new or used from online store,
- Purchase used from individuals via sites such as eBay, Craigslist, Amazon Marketplace etc.,
- Rent new or used from online service.
We recently started working with Bookbyte, a company that buys and sells textbooks online and I was surprised to learn the number of options available to students for securing school textbooks.
For the cash strapped student, renting books sounds like a great option, but it is important they read the fine print and to be disciplined about taking great care of their rented books and returning them on time. Failing to return your rented book on time, accessing marking in the text or the theft of a rented book can result in costing a student a lot more than estimated.
As the back-to-school rush is getting underway, there have been a number of articles about textbook rental. Many of these articles tout rental as a way for students to save money, however they only offer part of the story.
Renting a textbook may sound good because the upfront cost is less than buying the textbook, yet in many instances the student will end up paying more for the use of that book than they would have if they bought the text used and sold it back at the end of the term. Clearly, if you do not have the money to buy the textbook, then rental may be the right answer for you. However, buying used and selling the textbook at the end of the term offers the lowest overall cost.
To illustrate this point, Bookbyte recently compared the costs associated with renting and buying a specific book, the seventh edition of, “Project Management: A Managerial Approach” by Jack Meredith and Samuel Mantel. The analysis revealed buying the book used and selling it back at the end of the term would save a student 29 percent or roughly $18 over renting the same book. Multiply that savings by five, which is the average number of textbooks a student needs per term according to a 2009 report from Student Monitor, and a student could save an estimated $90 per semester.
So if you are a student (or a parent of a student), it may make sense for you to look online to buy or sell used textbooks. You may even recoup enough cash to by an iPad as digital textbooks on this platform are arriving soon.