In the earlier post on this topic, we concluded that I could have saved around 30 percent of what I paid for my two least expensive textbooks had I rented one of them online. I actually got a fairly decent price on a used copy of the second text from the student bookstore at my school, so I don’t need an alternative for that book. Thus, looking at only the two cheapest books, I have already overpaid by nearly 150 percent. A rather inauspicious — and non-frugal! — start to my Spring term.
In this post, we’ll see if I can do better on the remaining four — painfully expensive — textbooks, one of which is a custom-created monstrosity that my professor (at a public community college!) and his colleagues seem to believe is worth $150. As always, I’ll do a little bit of research, but if you, my frugal readers, have any better ideas, please let me know. I have until January 18 to find alternatives and return my still-shrinkwrapped books for full price.
Okay, let’s start with my marketing text, oh so playfully titled, MKTG. For the sixth edition of this text, authored by Lamb, et al., I was charged more than $15 per letter in the title: $64.95. As of this writing, Textbooks.com is currently sold out of both new and used copies of the book. Am I lucky just to have one? After further investigation, it seems that the site has moved all its stock into its book rental program because it is happy to rent me a copy at $24.99 for the entire spring semester. The site’s “Marketplace” had a copy of the book as low as $43, but they wanted to hit me with another $4 in shipping. Still, even at $47, I have overpaid by almost a third. Amazon, on the other hand, wanted nearly $45 just to rent the book. Judging my textbook by its plastic-sealed cover, I can’t see anything that screams out to me that I must have this tome for always and ever. So, if I can save $40 (or around 60%!) of the cost by renting the book, why not? Textbooks.com wins, slightly edging out BookRenter, which is a dollar less but wants the book back three weeks sooner.
Moving up the price ladder, Ingram’s Sell (3rd ed.) comes in at a wallet-gouging $79.95. BookRenter is out of the 3rd edition but will rent me the 2nd edition for $10.99. Amazon, however, will sell me a NEW copy for $52.49 and is currently offering free shipping on orders over $25. I can by a used one from an Amazon Marketplace seller for as little as $30 plus shipping for a total of $34. Chegg.com is the only renter that I could find with the book in stock, and wants $26 for the rental. In this case, it may be worth just buying the book from Amazon ($4 price difference) and save the return hassle. In doing so, I still save (including shipping) $45 off what I paid at the school bookstore, or a whopping 60% discount.
Now, we get to the serious big dogs. Vaughn’s Doing Ethics set me back the price of an iPhone with a contract: $93.50. The REALLY horrible thing about buying this book is that, not only did they charge me (less than two weeks ago) almost $100 for this text, a new edition comes out on January 2, which will of course make my 2nd edition basically worthless. This seems like an immediate-return scenario so that I can capitalize on the woes of other students in my situation. I’ll do some initial research now, but it may be worth waiting a few days before I pull the trigger on this particular purchase/rental. Amazon is selling the text new for $80, but it’s already going for a deflated $27 in the Marketplace. Rentals from both BookRenter and Textbooks.com come in around $24 (Chegg.com is $29). Again, I fall in the have something to show for my money camp and favor springing for the extra $3 and buying the used book.
So, before we move on to the custom text, let’s recap. For Mktg., Sell and Doing Ethics, I paid a total of $238.40. If I rent Mktg. from Textbooks.com and buy the other two used from Amazon Marketplace, I will pay a total of around $86 (including shipping) for the three books. A savings of more than $150… almost 60% of what I paid.
After some casting about on the Web, I have been unable to find a copy of the custom materials for sale. I’ll see if there’s anything posted at the school itself, but it looks like I may just have to grit my teeth and take the $150 that I was charged for this one. The final grand total of all my books, once more frugally purchased/rented will be $261, which is more than $160 (nearly 40%) less than I paid at the school. You all enjoy your post-holiday returns at the mall… I’m going to the campus bookstore!
I find it insulting when textbooks have “student edition” or “college edition” smeared across their titles. I don’t know what other type of edition such textbooks are being differentiated from, perhaps teacher edition, but the very presence of such a category makes it feel like a dumbed-down copy (oh, this is only the college edition, sorry…), and of course for the price one pays, it shouldn’t be dumbed down at all. but these are strictly my feelings.
for $80 you can buy the corpus of classical economic texts and, with some time at a good library, come out with more knowledge of economics than most people with a bachelor’s degree in the field. this is true of philosophy, too. of course, this IS a matter of supply and demand. only so many textbooks are used in lower division and gen ed requirement classes, and since everybody in college must go through these classes as prerequisites for higher division courses (=super high demand), publishers jack the price up. and…who wouldn’t? the very structure of higher education causes this, and you know publishers have deals with schools that force teachers to assign the newest editions, though the best teachers find ways to not make it matter so much. I had a textbook that, seriously, on the very first page, actually provided a “justification” of why a newer edition was needed. it’s a dirty business.
if the book is $20 or under, I pay full price for a new copy. I usually hunt amazon for better deals on other textbooks. and if I want to study a subject in my free time, I search for older editions of books and have snagged a number for $5-10 that otherwise would have cost over $70, even a seven-year old book that would have cost over $200 in its newest edition!
also, I do like the irony of a community college professor putting together an exorbitantly priced book for students. personally, I would have hunted for a different professor if the book was professor-specific and my schedule easily afforded the change.
Adam Smith would be proud! Thanks for the comments.