<p>S’s microeconomics professor, bless his heart, is using the 11th edition (2005) of a textbook that is currently on the 13th edition. He emailed the students several weeks ago to tell them that the bookstore is stocking the wrong edition. Bookstore price: $178.25 new, $133.75 used. I found the 11th edition on Amazon, in very good condition, for $1.16!</p>
<p>We use Dealoz to find the best deals overall, then check ratings and condition carefully. It’s been 2 years now and we’ve never had a problem with most of our purchases coming from half with a handful of others. This semester what would have cost be in excess of $900 via the bookstore (buying used when possible) cost a little over $300 including a couple that had to be bought at the bookstore.</p>
<p>There’s no way I’d switch to bookstore-only personally. Well, maybe if I had an unlimited budget, but I don’t. One just has to be careful buying IMO - and have a college that doesn’t pull the switch that the OP had to deal with. That would be annoying.</p>
<p>Those professors who will concede to use a previous edition book are angels. My son’s A&P professor said up to two past editions were fine. Found one used for 30 bucks. 300 for the latest edition, new. wow.</p>
<p>The OP’s dilemma points out the importance of not buying textbooks too early. Wait as long as you can, even the first week of classes, to buy. Despite the new textbook law (which is unworkable because it does not take into account that staffing of sections is unstable right up to the beginning of the semester), there is still a realistic possibility that the posted required books will change.</p>
<p>I saved a couple of hundred dollars this fall over college bookstore prices by purchasing new books from Amazon, and used books through barnes and noble and half.com (Some of the sellers through half.com are actually off campus bookstores, and a quick internet search will turn up their phone numbers.) I had great luck this summer purchasing a new statistics book on half.com for a great price and then selling it at the end of the summer (also through half.com) for more than I paid for it!</p>
<p>My son’s college bookstore does post ISBN’s, however, a couple were not posted until right before school started, and emails to the professors were not completely successful.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, however, there were two textbooks that I had to bite the bullet on and pay full bookstore price. One was a physics book packaged with an online access code, and the other was a “custom” edition of a standard introductory poli sci book. The latter is particularly frustrating because, not only has it not arrived at the bookstore yet (two weeks into class), but can’t be re-sold anywhere, unless the professor decides to use it again!</p>
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<p>The online access code can usually be purchased separately from the publisher. (Indeed, that is one way they support the sales of used books by the bookstore.) Thus, we purchase the text online and the access code direct.</p>
<p>Yes, those so-called custom editions are a PIA.</p>