Buying Guide for School Books Online

I don’t know about you, but I hate spending so much money for school and then realizing that it would cost me another $500 dollars just to have the supplies necessary for me to attend classes. Book prices are outrageous and make it difficult for the normal college student to afford even attending school. Walking into the school bookstore and finding the books you need is a stressful task. A lot of times they don’t have the book you need in stock and you have to wait for it to come in, or if they do have it they only carry the complete bundle including the study guide thats $30 dollars more expensive. But fear not, friends, I have discovered many alternatives to finding the schoolbooks you need online at the fraction of the costs to you. Also, in order for you to get the idea, I’ve taken one of the books from my classes and shopped for it online to show you a comparison of prices and experiences. The book is titled The Media of Mass Communication, 7th edition. I will list each source and the lowest price I found for the book I was looking for.

Half.com
Lowest Price of Book: $0.99
A division of eBay, Half.com offers an totally separate section for simply textbooks. Find the book you need simply by entering the IBSN number or the title, and often times find prices that are more than 50% cheaper than your school bookstore. You’ll get a lot of resellers who have used books that people have sold back to them or even some new books that retailers are getting wholesale. I have ordered from here in the past, and although it’s hit or miss because of the individual sellers, you can usually be assured to find a seller who has a good feedback rating that provides quality books. One time, I purchased a book that had notes written everywhere in the book that I used to study for the entire semester. I was surprised at how low the price was, but the quality of the book was only good, and the super low price leaves me wary about the book, considering the original retail in my school bookstore is $83.

eCampus.com
Lowest Price of Book: $34.57 (used)
A site specifically made for college students which not only covers book sales, eCampus also sells apparel and other supplies online for discounts. Although some of the prices I found weren’t as low as on Half.com, they give me a little more comfort at finding the book that I need. THey have quality used books that I have purchased in the past and they are quick when it comes to shipping. They have a wider selection of books that other places may not, and they also offer free shipping when an order gets above $49.99. A good option for you to try out and see if you can compound your order. This allows you to receive multiple books from one retailer and you’ll receive them all at once.

efollett.com
Lowest Price of Book: n/a (not in stock)
This is useful site, but it’s not for everyone. What I suggest to you searchers is to log on here and see if your college is among those covered by the site. You’ll find a good selection of the books that you need should your school be listed here. However, for my search, my school isn’t listed here and it wuold take too much work for me to find the book I need from another school. This basically leaves you with the ability to furnish all your books from their site only when your school is listed as covered by the site.

CollegeBooksDirect.com
Lowest Price of Book: $38.92 (new)
This was the only online store that had the book brand new at a very good price. It was extremely easy for me to use, as there was a search option on the front page that I inputted the ISBN number into. Immediately the book I needed came up. I did some other browsing on the site. It doesn’t offer the variety of products online that eCampus did in terms of apparel and other supplies, but I consistenly found book prices t be a bit cheaper on this page than on the others for new condition. Overall, this would have to be my choice for the best site because of the availability of new books at very good prices.