Are you looking to declutter? Have more than a few old books lying around? You could be holding on to a treasure that someone else would pay good money for. Before you consider donating your old books or tossing them in the trash, see if you can make extra money by selling your used books with these top sites. Many books will go for $2 – $20 each!
1. Make Extra Money with Facebook Groups
Facebook groups are a very popular platform for selling books. Depending on your collection, you can choose to sell by region or by interest. If you have a varied assortment of books by top authors that are trending among today’s readers, you should look into selling on a local buy/sell/swap group. Search your town, county, or neighborhood with the words “buy” or “sell” to see what pops up. Ask to join, and follow all rules for selling.
If your collection is very specific (you have all art books or you homeschool), you can find buy and sell groups with members just interested in buying these niche titles. Use keywords that describe the books you’re selling when searching on Facebook. You’ll find that you can usually get better prices when you make extra money from special interest groups than you can at online auction sites, such as eBay.
Sign into your Facebook account to get started.
2. Open an Amazon Store
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There are a few ways to sell your used books on Amazon. The first is to set up a seller’s profile and list the books in your online store. There are fees associated with doing this (currently $39.99 a month plus selling fees), but having a shop is a good way to make extra money with Amazon. Your store will generate revenue, and you’ll need to handle customer service requests, shipping, and marketing. It’s quite a bit of work, but worth it for someone with a lot of books to sell!
Open your Amazon Store by clicking here.
3. Try Amazon Individual Sales
If you just have a few in-demand titles, you may find the Amazon individual seller account to be more your liking. Once you’ve been approved to sell, you can enter your book’s ISBN number or title, and click the “Have One to Sell” button under the price box. You’ll be taken to a page to start your listing, complete with current listing prices to help you set your price to sell. All fees will be calculated for you before you sell, making it easy to see what your profit will be after the sale is made.
Become an Amazon individual seller at this link.
4. Use the Amazon Buy Back Program
Amazon also has a Buy Back program for select educational titles. When this option is showing, you can easily trade in your book for an Amazon gift card with no hassle, fees, or listing needed. (This program is alternatively called the “trade in” program.)
Start selling your items for Amazon credit here.
5. Open an eBay Seller’s Account
Yes, this is still a go-to source for selling books, although the marketplace is saturated for best-selling titles. If you have a specialty book and are very patient with your listing, you can get a good price for you hard-to-find title. eBay makes it easy to list books by using the ISBN number to fill out your book’s information in the listing. It is still advised to provide your own photos, however. These will give buyers more information about the condition of your book, instill trust, and help you move your inventory faster. You are also encouraged to price your book according to what similar titles have sold for, not what they are currently priced at. (You can check this number by viewing “completed” and “sold” listings for books with the same ISBN as yours.)
Not seeing your books sell like you’d like? Ebay allows sellers to entertain offers made on their inventory. Set your listings up to accept any reasonable offers made (85% of original asking price, for example) and see your books sell!
Open your eBay seller account by signing up at this link.
6. Search BookScouter.com
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Want to know that best place to sell your books online? Bookscouter might make the process easier. While not perfect, it can take more recent titles and show you the price you can get at over a dozen book buyers and trade-in sites. Note that these are sites that buy back your book to resell themselves, so you will get wholesale pricing. Many also pay your shipping fees to send them the book they are buying from you. Expect this convenience to bring your final payment down around $4 per book sold.
If you do have a more recent title or a textbook that’s in demand, you can see the price you might get from the following online sites (list is subject to change at any time):
- TopDollar4Books
- RentText
- CKY Books
- Buyback Express
- Buyback101
- BooksRun
- MyBookMonkey
- BlueRocketBooks
- Bookstores.com
- TextbookRecycling
- Textbooks.com
- Cash4Books
- SellBackYourBook
- TextbookRush
- Bookbyte
- ValoreBooks
- Powell’s
Start comparing book prices and make extra money at BookScouter.com by clicking here.
7. Apply at Abe Books
Abe Books is a top destination for those looking to buy high-quality and hard-to-find books. Abe’s requires all of their sellers to fill out an application for approval, however. Once accepted, you will spend $25 a month to have your store, plus fees. Not wanting to go through the hassle of a store? Their buy-back program is pretty simple. Search for your book, the get offers. You’ll get free FedEx shipping on books you sell to Abe.
Apply for an Abe’s Seller account here. Or sell books as an individual by clicking here.
8. Become an Etsy Seller
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Finally, here’s an option for those who can present their books in a artful and aesthetic manner. Even if your book isn’t in high-demand, you might be ale to sell it on Etsy as a one-of-a-kind conversation piece! Books on Etsy usually fall under one of four categories:
Books by color/shape/size
Many people order books solely for the look they give a bookshelf or room. By not caring what’s inside them, they will blindly order a set. Price your books as a collection in similar visual trait to make this tactic work.
Books by collectability
Vintage and antique books have found home here on Etsy. Find 50-year-old sci-fi classics mixed in with the books your Grandma read as a girl. Books with colorful illustrations or unique covers go for more money.
Books for their pages
This one is hard for the book lover to accept, but if you have a book that’s of no other value, you might be able to sell just the pages for crafts or upcycled art projects. Books have even been sold cover-free and tied together with twine. As long as books have a value in this manner, you can likely get something for even the most unwanted title.
Mystery Books
“Tell me a little about you, and I’ll find the perfect book for you.” This is the promise of “mystery” book sellers, who hope to match book lovers with a blind date of random literature. Since buyers have to fill out an interest from, the higher book price includes the matchmaking as well as the title. This unique way to sell books is catching on and commanding more than just a random book sent through the mail.
Sign up for an Etsy seller’s account by clicking here.
Make Extra Money with Even More Books?
There is one good things that online book sellers have come to love about book sales. Since books qualify for media mail shipping rates, they have a lower overhead than sales of DVD’s, video games, or other forms of entertainment. And with books appearing on every garage sale and thrift store shelf, there’s always a chance you can make a special find without trying. You might move beyond just clearing out your closet and get into the book reseller business for good. It’s an excellent and interesting way to make extra money!