Goodbye, books! Hello, Dole Whips!

I love a good book. In my many years as an adult human, I have amassed a sizable collection. At a certain point I realized I had more books than I could ever hope to read. When I say “at a certain point”, I mean, when my bookshelves were over flowing. And when I say “overflowing” I mean, I have gotten as creative as I can get with getting more books. My stacks got stacks. And when I say “I realized”, what I really mean is, “Mr B told me no more books in the house until I got rid of some because he’s tired of bumping into my stacks of books on every available surface.”

While it is never fun to say goodbye to our loved items, there comes a time in every household object’s life when it must move on. Maybe it is getting recycled. Maybe it is getting donated. And maybe, just maybe, it is getting sold. To make money for a Disney Fund.

There’s a variety of ways you can sell your no longer needed home goods. We’ve talked on this page about yard sales or selling on Ebay being great ways to turn your clutter into cash. Another option is to sell your stuff back to retail sites, online or brick & mortar, in exchange for either store credit or cold hard cash.

When Mr. B issued his book ultimatum, I set to clearing my stacks. “Clearing” meaning picking up each book in turn, promising I would never abandon it, and then setting it back on the shelf. While I was “clearing” I found some old copies of Disney movies that we had forgotten about because we upgraded when the new editions came out. Mr. B is all, “See? Your books are taking other thing hostage!” And I am all, ‘Hey, I can sell these!”

Now I’ve got books AND movies to sell. What are my best options?

Amazon

The first place I looked was the jungle. The Amazon Trade-In Program accepts books, electronics, video games, and DVD/Blu Rays in good condition. “Books” includes textbooks and homeschool materials.

The process is simple: click the link above, or go to the Amazon website, type “Trade In”, and you’ll be taken to that program’s page. You’ll see the categories of items they accept. There is a search feature to find title offers within those categories.

Pick your trade category.

See what Amazon will trade for your items.

When you’ve selected your items for trade, you’ll enter your information, and get a mailing label to print. Amazon pays for shipping. This allows them to track your items and you’ll be alerted once they arrive to Amazon. There is a window of time between when you print your mailing label and when the items are expected to be in the mail, so don’t print until you are ready to ship.

You’ll receive an Amazon credit that can be used in the future. You can use that Amazon credit for gifts, groceries, what have you, and then transfer that money you would have spent from your gift, grocery, or what have you budget into your Disney Fund.

Local Book Store

I’ll be real, I ended up with like 40 books to sell (sob), and I did not feel like putting each ISBN number into Amazon to see if they would trade me because I am lazy. By “lazy” I mean, “heartbroken over saying goodbye to my books.” Plus, while the Amazon trade in prices were great for electronics, they were a little less exciting for books. Also, I was not about to sit outside in my yard and sell books. I would price them all at $400 and I would sell nothing and Mr. B would use them as kindling for our bonfire.

We have a chain here called Half Price Books, and they buy back most books, refusing only ones in rough shape or that they have no hope of selling. I’ve been before but never with a haul this big. Worth a shot.

Selling to a chain that accepts buy back, like Half Price Books, or a local store that buys used books is a great option because you get cash immediately. You can usually get store credit as a possibility as well, with some stores giving you a higher percentage of store credit. For example, they’ll offer you $20 in cash or $25 in store credit. Mr. B went with me to make sure I didn’t choose the store credit option and bring home even more books.

Many of these places also accept movies and music in their buyback programs, paying very nicely for popular titles (Disney) or desirable formats (vinyl). What I like about a buy back program vs a yard sale for books, movies, and music is that the store is setting the price based on what they think they can re-sell it for. They’re not going to haggle with you. You, and by you I mean me, won’t be tempted to overprice your books based on sentimental worth and not market value.

I was pleasantly surprised that my books and movies earned me $38. I went in hoping for $20, and my expectations were almost doubled. This was a great, (relatively) painless way to add to my Disney Fund, as well as declutter my house. If you’re upgrading gaming devices or stereo equipment, unloading some vinyl records you inherited, of you have a husband who wants to walk through his home without the fear of being caught in a book avalanche, look into a trade in program.

Do you use trade in programs? Where have you had the best luck, online or in person? Are you a book hoarder like me? Tell me all about it in the comments!

Kristen B. is wife to the best Prince around, mama to the spunkiest little princesses, and lover of all things Disney. She started her savings journey five years ago and is now dedicated to making her family’s wishes come true one coupon at a time. She is so excited to take her love of saving to the next level and share her journey with you! Click here to catch up on Kristen’s Savings and join in on your own savings adventure!

If you see a penny

Pick it up

And all day long

You’ll have good luck

I was in fourth grade when I first heard this little catchphrase. It was part of a unit we were doing on poetry and while I remember nothing else from my fourth grade poetry lessons, I do remember thinking, “I wonder if pennies are really good luck?”

So whenever I saw a penny (or nickel or dime) on the ground, I picked it up. I picked up so many pennies (and nickels and dimes) that I started saving them in a special shoe box I had decorated with my idea of what “luck” looked like. (Luck, in case you don’t know, looks a lot like unicorns, rainbows, four leaf clovers and lightening bolts.)

When my father found my luck box during a routine room clean, he asked what I was saving for. I had no idea what he was talking about, and explained about the poem and my stockpile of luck. He then explained to me the concept of saving money. We counted up my money, and after putting 10% in my bank savings, I had enough left over to go buy myself a few Littlest Pet Shops.

As time marched on, I remembered the part of always putting 10% into your savings account, but forgot the part about picking up pennies. I’m old now. I’ve been pregnant for the better part of the last five years, so I couldn’t even see the pennies on the ground if I wanted to.

But now I’ve got little luck chasers of my own. The other day, I caught the Glass Slipper fussing with our Dimes for Disney jar. I asked what she was doing and she silently held out a little fist full of change. I asked her where she had gotten it. Apparently, everywhere. Kroger, Target, the parking lot of her school, the floor of our car, underneath my desk. She told me she has just been looking for money to put in the jar so we can go to “the castle.”

Touched and encouraged, I sat with her to count it out. Y’all. In the span of a few weeks, my five year old collected $2.98. That’s half a Mickey Bar!

The lesson here is two fold:

Free money is free money. A penny may not seem like much, but put it together with a bunch of other pennies, and you’ve got the payment for a snack or a souvenir. Sometimes I get so caught up in making the “big money” (the surveys, or the grocery overflow) that I discount the small stuff.

Which is a big mistake. Don’t ignore that dime on the ground. It’s free! You didn’t have it before, now you do, and you didn’t have to do anything for it. That’s the best kind of Disney fund deposit.

Get your kids involved! Listen, as stated above, I am older now and the knees and the eyesight aren’t what they once were. But I’ve got two little ladies who are low to the sound and have keen eyesight. These gals love going to Disney World, so why involve them in the saving aspect? Get them involved on the ground level? Pun intended ;)

You could do a mini Dimes for Disney jars with them. Let them decorate the jars with their favorite Disney characters or past memories. Tell them they get to decide what part of the vacation they want to put their found money towards. That Dole Whip is going to taste a lot sweeter to them when they know it was their effort that got everyone a delicious snack.

Don’t discount the small ways you save for Disney, or the small people who want to be involved. Small steps and big steps on the same road lead to the same place. To quote our favorite frog loving princess, “Every penny counts.” So if you see a penny, pick it up.

Kristen B. is wife to the best Prince around, mama to the spunkiest little princesses, and lover of all things Disney. She started her savings journey three years ago and is now dedicated to making her family’s wishes come true one coupon at a time. She is so excited to take her love of saving to the next level and share her journey with you! Click here to catch up on Kristen’s Savings and join in on your own savings adventure!