What's Better Than Used Textbooks? Rentals!

Each year, about 4 million trees are cut down to make paper for textbooks. Many of these books are used once and discarded. Others find their way back to a bookstore where they’re sold again, but there’s an even better way to save money and trees – rent your textbook!

A few Internet sites now make it easy to rent textbooks online. With textbook prices triple what they were in the mid-1980s and the price for a single book often exceeding $100, rentals make a lot of sense. You simply find the book you want, pay a rental fee that can save you 60-70% off the price of a new or used textbook, keep and use the book as long as you need it for your class, and then send it back with prepaid shipping. It’s quick, easy, and, above all, eco-friendly. Want to give it a try? Chegg and BookRenter are two sites that allow you to rent textbooks and save trees.

Chegg will not only help keep more trees from being chopped to create new books, but they will also plant a new tree for each book you rent or buy from them. So far, the company has planted over 200 acres of trees through partnerships with nonprofit environmental organizations. At Chegg, you’ll find over a million textbooks for rental, as well as books for sale. Rental periods are for a quarter, semester or summer, and you can extend any rental for an additional 15 or 30 days. Delivery is available via Priority or Standard mail, and return shipping is free via prepaid postage.

BookRenter.com is another online rental site. They also offer over a million textbooks for rent, and you can select from one of five available rental periods and from three shipping options: Ground, 2 Day, and Next Day Air. Each rental comes with free return shipping, and the rental period can be extended on any book. You can also choose to buy the book at the end of your rental period, if you choose.

So if you want to stop standing in line for books and save a tree, go rent your textbooks.