7 Sites You Should Bookmark To Save On College Textbooks

Collegebookrenter.com

This site promises savings up to 85% off the cover price of textbooks. It claims to have the largest textbook inventory on the market and also allows you to sell or buy books new.

CEO Chuck Jones says they aren't offering e-books at the moment but since they don't charge customers for shipping costs, there's not much of a savings there anyway. And if you're really into highlighting the margins, Jones promises they're far more lenient in that regard. 

Chegg.com.

This site has a huge inventory of books for rent and it recently launched an e-book rental service as well. You can download books to your account and access them anytime on the Web.

The only drawback is they're only available as streaming files, so you have to have an Internet connection to access them and they can't be downloaded. 

Campusbookrentals.com. 

They give you a 15-day late return grace period and offer three options for rentals: 55 days (summer), 130 days (semester) and 85 days (quarter). Extra perk: They're cool with highlighting fanatics, too. 

Half.com.

This eBay-owned site lets you rent and buy your books online. You can even print a free return labels to send you rentals back to shelves. 

Edubookswap.com. 

This site is a bit different in that it charges a fee ($8.95) for swapping services. If you sign up for a five-swap plan, that gets knocked down to $7.99 per book.

But the cool part is every book you post for sale accrues points toward your account, which can then be applied to a book purchase. The points for each book are based on fair market value of the book, age and demand. 

Bookmooch.com 

If you want to pass around textbooks and get a dose of philanthropy at the same time, check out Bookmooch.com. 

This is a true swap site, in that you trade books with other users and get points for every book you give away. For each book you give, you can get one back in return and you only pay the cost of shipping. You can also request books from other countries and choose to donate points to charities. 

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