Textbooks are expensive. It is a fact if not a universal law. Thankfully in the 21st Century there are more options other than your campus bookstore. There are in fact dozens of options online where one can shop for the best price on their books. The same is true when it comes time to resell those books. For those who are excessively thorough it can take hours to surf through all of those sites in order to track 5your book titles.
Different PCTs (price comparison tools) will list different prices for the same website. For example, a copy of Biology (ISBN 080537146X) has a $20 dollar cost swing on Half.com according to two leading websites. Some websites list shipping costs, while others go a step further and list the costs of different shipping options. Some don’t list shipping costs at all requiring some extra work. Certain websites also list any website coupons or deals within the information about the book.
Campusbooks.com has a pretty incredible Price Comparison Tool. Campusbooks.com is dedicated to the textbook marketplace, and as a result invest tremendous resources to building and improving their PCT. It lists the leading web marketplaces—eBay, Half.com, eCampus, Textbooks.com, Barnes&Noble.com, and Amazon.com as well as a dozen others. The site goes on to break down the version of the text (New, Used, International, Rental, eBook or Teacher’s) and its lowest price. They offer a level of filtering that provides a tremendous amount of information on one page. They include everything from shipping price and availability to condition quality notes to coupons and merchant return policies. In a word, it’s extensive.
As always it pays off to be thorough. Nowadays thanks to Campusbooks.com and similar websites it takes far less time to be thorough and find the best textbook deals. The PCT’s are great but nothing is perfect. Take a little extra time and double check through the specific website, most will list comments regarding the buyer or seller. When that poorly rated seller is offering a too good to be true deal on that textbook it probably is.
