Stop Wasting Money on Texbooks: Tips for College Students

Studying in college in US is outrageously expensive on its own and if this wasn’t enough, they want you to buy overpriced textbooks with your own money. Texbook prices are just ridiculous and each year it’s only getting worse. The good news is – there are a lot of ways to avoid buying them and we’re going to share this information with you to make your huge student’s loan a little bit smaller.

Visit your local library. Most of the libraries have all the copies you need and if it’s not there, most of them are linked together via some sort of a system and they will tell you if it’s available somewhere else. This is probably the easiest way you can get free textbooks but sadly, they can sometimes lack the specific books you need and you might have to resort to other means to get them.

Look for older releases. If you can’t find the specific copy, try looking for older editions. If your professor just released a 7th version of his book, you can probably get 6th or 5th edition. Unless it’s clearly stated that the information in the book is outdated, the only differences that you will notice will be different page numbers or pictures. Fundamental information in science rarely changes so this is a great chance to either find the textbook you need in the library or buy it for a really low price.

Consider e-books as your new best friend. Some of the libraries scan books and make them available to download. You can also print them out if needed or you can use your tablet for all your reading purposes. There are great options in the market right now if you’re looking for a tablet so investing in something similar to a Kindle might be profitable in the long run if you prefer e-books over old fashioned paperback copies since these days they’re cheaper than a single textbook!

Rent it out. If everything else fails and there’s no other way than to just buy the book – think about renting it. Check out some of the websites online as there are countless different ways you can get your books rented for you for ridiculously low prices.

Know if you actually need it. To top everything off, you should ask around if you actually need those textbooks. Many times students buy textbooks and end up completely wasting their money since they didn’t use them a single time after they bought it. Try asking around in various Facebook groups or find someone who already passed the class you’re taking. It’s really a waste of money to buy a huge textbook for a $100 just for the exercises at the end of each section – just scan it off your friend and print it out.