Save With Dave

Save With Dave: E-books

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) ― Dave Bender shows how students and parents can save a bundle on those pricey textbooks.

In the digital age, it was only a matter of time before books went paperless, and paperless means cheap. We headed out to UC Davis to check out their electronic books program, which was one of the first in the country.

It's a huge expenditure, and there's pretty much no way of escaping buying textbooks, but keep e-books in mind.

"Up front savings is the biggest benefit," said Jason Lorgan, the UC Davis Book Department Manager. "You pay less at the beginning."

E-books cost an average of 40 percent less than new textbooks. The trend is taking its time catching on with UC Davis students because, overall, the better deal is to buy used, but only if you resell them at the end of the term.

Only about 30 percent of college students actually do that.

"They believe they're going to refer to them at a later time," Lorgan said.

The benefits of e-books are up-front cost and convenience of not lugging around a bunch of heavy books. The drawbacks are you can't sell them back, and depending on the publisher, there may be a limit on how many pages you can print.

So the average student spends $900 a year on textbooks, but get the e-book versions and you save $360 a year.

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