But what about the textbooks?

Okay. You have done your due diligence and you have found the cheapest tuition (or you have found a way to avoid tuition altogether!). You are feeling good about yourself and you decide you should go ahead and purchase your textbooks.

Oh my gosh!!!

Suddenly, you discover that the textbooks are going to cost you more than the actual classes. Hard to believe? Given that the cheapest textbooks seem to be about $75, it's not all that hard to believe.

How do you get past this mess? To start with, never buy your textbooks from the school if you can at all avoid it. Any bookstore with a building is going to have books that cost more. Staffs need to be larger. Lights need to be kept on.

No, I say no. Instead, you have several options:

1. If you want new books, go to Amazon.co.uk and see if they have the book available. These books, called gray market books, are often significantly cheaper even if you have to pay for shipping to the U.S. Guess what? These books often start out in the U.S., are shipped to the United Kingdom, and then come back here when you buy them. Why are they cheaper? British students will not pay the equivalent of $100 for a book. There are just too many cheaper options for them.
2. Try one of the online stores like eCampus.com. Yes, that is their search box off to the right and, yes, I make a tiny bit if you buy from them. So buy elsewhere or try them. Either is fine with me. The important thing to realize is that there are online bookstores besides Amazon. However, I can tell you that eCampus is a good service and I have used them in the past (and will use them again, I am sure).
3. Buy from Amazon.com, but buy used. Often the books have been hardly touched.
4. Try the price comparison websites like AddAll.com, BooksPrice.com, and BookFinder.com. Be careful to cost compare. Sometimes the prices found are actually more than if you just picked it up from Amazon.

While these are starting points, you would do well not to do what is easiest. You have been so smart in deciding to spend less on college. Don't blow those savings on books!

Comments

[Lane]

That "other" cheap degree site isn't the only one. I updated an ebook on the same topic and have a "cheap" website for it.

[Tom Nixon]

The difference is that you are not running a scam. That other site most assuredly is doing so.

And, if you were so inclined, you could send what you are selling to me, and I might review it on the site.

[Donna]

I was tempted to buy the ebook http://www.yourcollegeforless.com/ (post above by Lane) but it gave no information on the number of pages, the table of contents, a sample of the contents, date it was published, testimonials, no money back guarantee, and no idea who the author publisher is - not even a last name (plus no way to contact you). Ask yourself, looking objectively at the sales page, would you buy it when the odds are its information you already know put together by someone in his own room at his parents house?

You might be missing out on sales if you could give a better idea of what the product is and why the information is special and not well known. For all buyers know it could be just 10 pages double spaced of information consisting of information freely available on the Web regarding free financial aid from the government, how to fill out the FAFSA, and state, institutional, and private scholarships and loans. :) What could thousands of savvy students know that is a well hidden secret? I've been to college and know of no secret besides the above, and I don't Matthew Lesko does either. ;)

I know its only about $10.00, but people don't want to buy something when they are very unsure what they are getting and where they are getting it from. The ebook claims to have "insider information" with no hint at what kind of information it is, except that when you find out you will get to go to college almost for free. Sounds too good to be true, doesn't it?

Just feedback that may be helpful if you really do have a product that is worth the dollars.

[cpascal]

There are also a lot of free textbooks online, which are good for preparing for CLEP and DSST exams. I have a list of them on my blog at http://homeschool-college.blogspot.com/2010/07/free-textbooks.html.