Apartment Therapy Re-Nest | Survey: Do You Trade Books, CDs, or DVDs Online?

Survey: Do You Trade Books, CDs, or DVDs Online?

Photo from House Tour: Laura's Traditional, "No Place Like Home"

We've posted about our attempt to downsize our book clutter, and thanks to reader comments we recently tried some swapping websites. Paperbackswap, and its related sites SwapaCD and SwapaDVD, have been working well for us. While we love the public library, we do like owning some books for reference and sentimental reasons. Do you swap your books, cds, or dvds through online services? If so, which websites do you prefer? Survey below the jump...

Photo from Sondra and Ron's Dupont Dreamhome

We were very happy to send off a Fodor's travel guide on Provence, France that we used for a trip last year and won't need anytime soon. In exchange, we chose an-out-print art book that use for reference in our art work. Have you made any good trades online?

Comments (8)

I love PBS! The handy little counter tells me I have saved over $200 with the 63 books Ive swapped already...I have no doubts that it is correct as I spend a TON on books for myself, my partner and my kids. Some we want to keep, some we re-post.

The great thing about used books is that you never know when you will get a surprise in them...I have received 3 that were signed by the author and one with a love note from a little boy to his mommy tucked inside. :) The latter I offered to send back to its original owner...she was happy to have it back as her son had been grown for years and she had forgotten it in the book.

posted by Gayla on March 16th 2009 at 11:24am
view Gayla's profile

I use bookmooch for giving away books and finding books...i even gift books through this site... and it's all completely free.

really works out great. Also remember to mark your mail as "media mail" and the charge is significantly less expensive...figured that out a little late in the game ;)

posted by lu on March 16th 2009 at 11:44am
view lu's profile

i forgot to say that if you aquire more points than you use you can even dontate your points to charities registered through bookmooch... ie low income or struggling schools in the US and abroad. Really easy (and free) way to contribute.

posted by lu on March 16th 2009 at 11:46am
view lu's profile

I use PaperBack swap. It's great for clearing out stuff you're not using and finding great books you've been wanting. However, considering that you GET a book for every book that you SEND, it's not so useful if you simply need to downsize. ;)

posted by Elizabeth B on March 16th 2009 at 1:38pm
view Elizabeth B's profile

I've been using PaperbackSwap for quite a while now and I love it. I'm finally ahead on my credits, which means I don't have the exact same number of books as when I started:-)
It's been very useful for acquiring some hard to find books that I've been looking for forever, as well.

posted by DebbieJRT on March 16th 2009 at 5:25pm
view DebbieJRT's profile

I heart Paperback Swap!!! It's nice not to have books sitting around taking up space.

posted by AlaskaTeacher on March 17th 2009 at 12:03am
view AlaskaTeacher's profile

We use Swaptree. While Elizabeth is right that it doesn't really help in downsizing the number of books we have, it is a nice way to cycle books we don't want for books we do. We've even got a Wii game in exchange for a book!

posted by Kalinda on March 17th 2009 at 2:07pm
view Kalinda's profile

Bookmooch for book swapping.

posted by theaterdrm on March 18th 2009 at 2:35am
view theaterdrm's profile