Savvy Shopping

Feeling awesome today! Orientation for Law school starts this week and we have a busy schedule on top of the classes. Tonight we attend a welcome dinner, Tues there is a Bee's game that we are still deciding if we will attend or not, Wed there is a mingle with local lawyers, Thursday is an Oath swearing in ceremony (Note: they said professional dress Brian insisted that did not mean a suit, I insisted it did, I won he bought a suit. Talking to the 2L students at a pool party we went to Saturday they said professional dress meant suit, at least for that event, don't worry I got your back Bri ;) And there are invites to other events still coming in. Let the craziness begin.

We asked what everyone meant by law school being hard the first year. Whats so special about the first year? What do they do to you to make you think its so awful?! Well one described it as being as stressful as having a full time job, going to school full time and trying to maintain a relationship. Hmm sounds like our undergrad: 21 units in school, 40+ hours at work, and being newly weds. Not that that was easy and not that I wish to have those LONG days back but I hope those days prepared us to deal better with that kinda stress. We shall see.

But why am I so excited today? Well we are trying to do our best to stay out of debt while going to law school. A huge goal I know but I like a good challenge. So the budget for books and supplies for a year was estimated to be $4,216 which includes a budget for a new lap top for $2,300. So that means they estimate book costs to roughly be $958 a semester. Well not with this savy shopper. Brian was in California last week so when his schedule was released I looked up the book list and got to work. I checked out Amazon.com and half.com as well as scoured the many emails that flooded in from past students wanting to sell their books I also checked out a few rental companies. In the end I ordered 9 books including some supplemental books that were not required but recommended and the final total?! $215.14. Absolutely amazing!

Talking with students that did similar research to buy books online this weekend their totals were $500 on the low end! We managed to get our books for 22% of what they estimated it would be. My favorite was a like new book I picked up for $1.99, the shipping was close to $3. I love when the shipping is more than the book. That means I did really good. So that $700 we saved in books and the $2300 we saved by not buying a new lap top will go towards next semesters budget :) I love when money saved for one thing gets rolled over for another, true success.