10 Ways To Save Money As A Student In America

Go to school, go to college, get a job (hopefully), and pay for college the rest of your life—this is the commonly prescribed order into the dreaded real world.

Like a child promised a shiny coin for his tooth, the underclassman is expectant of future rewards for his pains. In the meantime, however, he has to survive.

The struggle is a good thing, though, because resourcefulness is equally as important as book smarts, and part of becoming an adult, there’s no motivator for resourcefulness like being broke (and too bogged down with studies to always work full time).

An outdoorsman trains for worst-case scenarios not only because survival skills will be required, but because he may be too wounded or malnourished to think clearly and will need to rely on muscle memory.

Likewise, since undergrad brain juices are often dangerously low from their academic efforts, it’s important to have a proper toolkit ahead of time.

Demand for current textbooks is high, and obviously college is Mecca for hundreds of thousands of the latest editions. Sure, the easiest way for a student to unload his biochemistry tome is to take it back to the bookstore and get a measly 6% back, but an entrepreneur could do better.

Nowadays, it’s incredibly easy to scan a book’s barcode with a smartphone and immediately see its resale value. Although this is the Information Age, not every student is necessarily savvy to this sort of thing, or may simply not care. But with some effective advertising and perhaps the convenience of picking up at clients’ homes, a textbook flipper could make bank—offering something better than the bookstore, but low enough to make a substantial profit.

Additionally, it might not be a bad idea to peruse local thrift stores for the same purposes.