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SFU Book buy-back

randomuser
edited December 2007 in General
How does it work at SFU?

At my college they werent that picky about marked up books as long as they looked nice on the outside, what about slight creases on covers?

What is everyones experience with the book buy back
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Comments

  • Kevin M.Kevin M.
    edited December 2007
    They don't really care if theirs highlighting or signs of use, but it has to be intact of course. It's nice that you can get cash for the books you won't be using anymore, but they only give you 60% of what you paid for it. The only thing I don't like about SFU buyback is that for most smaller books (ie. english novels) it's not even worth returning them because they give you a few dollars for each one even though you paid over 20 dollars for some of them.
  • Student0667
    edited December 2007
    Kevin M.;18808 said:
    but they only give you 60% of what you paid for it.
    Correction. Because they have a set amount that they will buy-back, they only give you 60% IF you are the first 5 to 10 people who return the book to them. After that, they barely give you 10% of the book.
  • vonnie
    edited December 2007
    And if that doesn't work, you can try Quad Books too, they give more than SFU bookstore, but they also have a quota. Make sure to check the wanted booklist they have in front of the store to see if they're taking backs the books you want to sell them.
  • Broken Lizard
    edited December 2007
    so this starts tomorrow at 9am... are there already huge lines then? lol
  • randomuser
    edited December 2007
    what and where is quad books?
  • Broken Lizard
    edited December 2007
    across from book store, i think one level down from main entrance
  • vonnie
    edited December 2007
    Triple;18817 said:
    so this starts tomorrow at 9am... are there already huge lines then? lol
    AHHH no :(
    That's gonna suck! Thanks for the reminder...

    Hopefully I can just sell them on online rather than get close to nothing back from SFU!!
  • Student0667
    edited December 2007
    vonnie;18815 said:
    they give more than SFU bookstore, but they also have a quota.
    No they don't. In fact, Quad Book is pretty much SFU bookstore's "extension" (aka bitc*) because they have to follow SFUBS's buy-back quota.
    Triple;18817 said:
    so this starts tomorrow at 9am... are there already huge lines then? lol
    I am waking up at 8:00AM tomorrow and start lining up at 8:30AM. If you are doing this too, I am THE tall Asian guy.
  • randomuser
    edited December 2007
    This sounds like crap...at my college the quota bought back was always big there was never any 10% bs
  • Student0667
    edited December 2007
    randomuser;18829 said:
    This sounds like crap...at my college the quota bought back was always big there was never any 10% bs
    Welcome to SFU: Where you get both the Glory and BS of being a University Students.

    I sometimes wonder why the Bookstore even bother buying new textbooks. Can't they just buy-back more all the old textbooks and buy new ones when the old ones are not meeting demand.
  • vonnie
    edited December 2007
    Student0667;18827 said:
    No they don't. In fact, Quad Book is pretty much SFU bookstore's "extension" (aka bitc*) because they have to follow SFUBS's buy-back quota.
    Yes they do, I've experienced it first-hand.
    Lots of my textbooks that are still in use this semester could not be sold back to neither Quad or SFU bookstores because they already "took too many in".

    That's why they cross stuff out on that 'wanted' book list too.
  • Broken Lizard
    edited December 2007
    hmm, maybe i should head there for 830 too lol........ according to the buyback thing, i'll get about 350 dollars for the books i have... that site is reliable right? the one on my.sfu...
    I dun want to haul 30 pounds of books for nothing, lol.

    If I do, I'm white guy with a black puma hoodie, lol
  • Student0667
    edited December 2007
    Triple;18837 said:
    hmm, maybe i should head there for 830 too lol........ according to the buyback thing, i'll get about 350 dollars for the books i have... that site is reliable right? the one on my.sfu...
    I dun want to haul 30 pounds of books for nothing, lol.

    If I do, I'm white guy with a black puma hoodie, lol
    It depends on rather there are another 15 white guy with a black puma hoodie hauling 30 pounds of book before you.
    vonnie;18831 said:
    Yes they do, I've experienced it first-hand.
    Lots of my textbooks that are still in use this semester could not be sold back to neither Quad or SFU bookstores because they already "took too many in".

    That's why they cross stuff out on that 'wanted' book list too.
    I am refering to the amount of cash they give you, not the quota thing.
  • Broken Lizard
    edited December 2007
    just look for the realllllly ugly one thats me, haha
  • p51dray
    edited December 2007
    Why bother with buyback? Look up the SFU used price (80% of new?) and sell it to someone at a couple bucks under that.
  • Student0667
    edited December 2007
    p51dray;18859 said:
    Why bother with buyback? Look up the SFU used price (80% of new?) and sell it to someone at a couple bucks under that.
    The problem is that looking for that someone is relatively difficult.

    1.) If you go to the door of that classroom on the first day of class and yell out your ad, chances are that most people already got the books.

    2.) Chances are that the professor, again, changed edition...

    3.) You risk not being able to sell this back even to the SFUBS if you can't find someone to buy it.
  • Broken Lizard
    edited December 2007
    maybe ill head there at like 3am and study all night so i'm first in line, haha.
    im guna study all night anyways, i can do it there...
    is the building open? all night?
  • randomuser
    edited December 2007
    so this is why people try to sell their textbooks to other people so hard at this school it makes sense now
  • Student0667
    edited December 2007
    randomuser;18873 said:
    so this is why people try to sell their textbooks to other people so hard at this school it makes sense now
    You are first year, are you? Welcome to SFU.
  • p51dray
    edited December 2007
    For 1), maybe it depend on the program? From my experience, most people in sciences will not buy textbooks until the first or second week.

    For 2), if the text gets changed, buyback won't buy it anyways.

    For 3), I think this is very unlikely if the book is for a common lower division course. For less frequent UD courses, your options are always limited anyways.
  • bernZ
    edited December 2007
    Ah rats.. hopefully there won't be too many people up there...
  • randomuser
    edited December 2007
    first year at sfu, not liking a lot of things so far like how all my exams are at 830 for some odd reason...i never get why they dont just hold finals in the same room as the lecture at the same time...i never take 3 hours to write exams
  • bernZ
    edited December 2007
    randomuser;18885 said:
    i never take 3 hours to write exams
    You may come to regret saying that some day.
  • Ether
    edited December 2007
    This is a little off topic, but I never understand why people leave early during exams.

    I mean, what's the WORST that could happen if you stick around for the extra hour and a half or less to look over your paper. Unless you know you have no chance of getting ANY marks at all, it's just a waste of your exam time which could potentially get you marks.
  • Broken Lizard
    edited December 2007
    maybe they have to go to the washroom and prof won't let anyone leave... happend to me before, haha
  • Kevin M.Kevin M.
    edited December 2007
    I'm usually one of the first people to leave when it comes to writing exams. The thing is, I know what I know (if that makes any sense). So for me to go over the exam again would mean that I would be second guessing what I wrote down, meaning I would be questioning what I knew when I originally wrote it down. So basically, I have just as much of a risk of losing marks as I do gaining marks by chance that I change a correct answer. I know there are some exams (mostly written) that you should always check over a second time, but most multiple choice exams are recognition based, so I rip through and get outta there before I can second guess my answers. And just for the record I have near perfected the art of studying for MC exams - I never get lower than 90% on MC questions.
  • Ether
    edited December 2007
    I always do well on multiple choice exams too.. but i haven't had a decent M/C exam since my first semester because I've been taking math and compsci courses.

    Also, I've noticed that the exams often have hard M/C where one answer is the obvious choice but is actually wrong because of some minute detail in the question.
  • bernZ
    edited December 2007
    Hah, tell me about it Ether.

    MC in compsci? What on earth are you talking about? All it means is they give you four answers, and you do the question. It isn't about recognition, are you kidding me?

    I guess MC exams for different faculties work differently from CS and Math.
  • randomuser
    edited December 2007
    I usually always finish first and usually get within the top 10 marks in the class when I write exams.

    Only ONCE did I not have enough time to do a test...and it was in a math course, I was having that exam anxiety shit and whoa... Ive never felt so frustrated before.

    As far as I'm concerned once I finish a test, going back over my answers isn't going to change a thing cause if I didnt remember it the first time I usually dont recall additional information after. The teachers even always say "go with your first instinct".

    I finished one of my exams that had 3 hours alloted today in 15 mins, just like the midterm where I got the 5th highest mark...I wonder what do the people do who stay like an hour or two do...? Cause I'm usually doing a lot better than the mean of the class. That being said I'm not THAT smart cause anything math involved just floors me.
  • bernZ
    edited December 2007
    So who was there first thing in the morning for buyback? I was first in line. geez, could have woken 1/2 hr later and still be first!

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