When Do You Sell Your College Textbooks on eBay?
By Pigglies
@Pigglies (9329)
United States
August 11, 2008 11:41pm CST
Are you the type of person who sells their books right after the class is over? Or do you wait until others start school and need to buy their books so that you get the best rate?
Do you sell them in anticipation of people from semester system schools buying them (August)? Or do you sell them with quarter system schools in mind (September)?
I usually wait to sell mine until an optimum time. Usually I go for after semester schools have just barely started so that they might order the books from me, but before the quarter system schools have started so that maybe the students who check their books early will buy from me. Usually this method works out pretty well for me.
1 person likes this
3 responses
@irisheyes (4370)
• United States
19 Aug 08
Wow, I sell books for a living and I was really surprised by this thread. I would expect that textbooks would sell better on Amazon. I don't usually sell text books because they are so easily outdated. However, I do sell a lot of the supplementary reading paperbacks for college courses and they do well on Amazon. Neither site has much of a market for first printings. Those go to Abe or catalogue auctions. I usually think of eBay as being good only for what I call odd ball books (Addiction books, photography monographs etc) but maybe I should look into eBay for the university press paperbacks I've been selling on Amazon. I think I'm doing pretty well with them on Amazon but it never hurts to check things out now and again. Thanks for the new info.
@Pigglies (9329)
• United States
20 Aug 08
I already have tons of textbooks all the time because I'm a college student. Yes, some do become outdated but I'd still rather sell them for something instead of just throwing them away.
eBay is actually pretty good for college textbooks I've found. I usually get great returns. Unless it's a book that is more rarely used and then I usually put it up on Half.com so that I'm not wasting listing fees.
Hope that helps you!
@geno1260 (30)
• United States
13 Aug 08
This is a very good question, and I will answer it to the best of my ability, but I believe that the question you are really asking is, how do I get the most money for my used books?
The best time to sell textbooks is in early Septembr or Early January.
As for ebay, often ebay will not get you the most money.
If you want to make sure that you'll sell the book at the best price the best thing to do is to go to a book price comparison site, such as www.wecomparebooks.com, and see how much others are selling the book for, and then list the book for a lower price. This will ensure that you sell the book at the best price.
@Pigglies (9329)
• United States
13 Aug 08
I've sold above the average asking price on eBay though. On Half.com I always sell below the average or the books never leave. But on all my eBay auctions I start the bidding at 99 cents and it goes up from there. I usually make average or above.
I will have to remember about January. I don't think I've ever sold books then.
On the plus side... I did just sell my physics book on Half.com. I bought it for $200 and got only $40 for it. But right after I used it the new edition came out. So I'm really amazed I sold it at all.
@TheHawkBat (669)
• United States
12 Aug 08
I never have actually sold a book or anything on E-Bay. It sounds like you have a fair amount of experience... Have you ever ended up selling something for way less than you could have gotten by other means? This seems like a real risk, and it keeps me from trying this.
@Pigglies (9329)
• United States
12 Aug 08
I've never sold anything at an unfair price to myself on eBay (at least, not more unfair than what the college bookstore would have given me). But I did make a mistake once on Half.com where I was selling a book set for $300 and I accidentally typed $30. The book set sold within a day and that was when I stupidly realized my error and had to ship the books at a loss (made even worse because the shipping cost 5 times what Half.com had estimated and they don't let you pick your own shipping price). Other than that though, I've had great experiences selling books online. I usually get back between 50 and 80% of the purchase price if I sell them on eBay. Once I made back 120% since I bought the book new in wrapper and apparently the person buying it needed it very badly.
