New textbooks. To avoid paying unfathomable new-book prices, see whether your university offers a rental program - such services are most often available for the school's core-curriculum and prerequisite classes. Or rent from a Web site such as Chegg.com, where you can save up to 85%. Order the book for a one-time fee - for example, about $60 plus shipping for a $180 calculus book -- keep it for a semester, then return it with free shipping, or you could buy it. (Chegg even plants a tree for every book you rent.)
You could also head to the used-book lot. BigWords.com searches the Web for the best prices on used textbooks. Always search for a book using its ISBN number -- not just the title -- to make sure you're getting the right book and the right edition. Also check with professors about peripheral materials that come packaged with textbooks, which used books may be missing.
A high-end laptop or desktop computer. An inexpensive laptop or netbook should meet your student's computer needs. For example, you can buy an Acer Aspire One, which has a 10.1-inch screen and weighs just 2.4 pounds, for less than $300 at Best Buy, WalMart or Target. Be aware, though, that netbooks don't have DVD drives or huge amounts of storage space, so it'll cost extra to get plug-in external drives or memory cards.
Printer. Here's what you can save by skipping this unnecessary item: about $50 for a printer, $30 for replacement ink and $9 for a pack of paper. For about $10, your child could buy a flash drive instead, save his 20-page term paper on it and print the paper in the campus computer lab, which you may already be paying for. Some schools include a technology fee in room and board costs -- $100 per semester in some cases.
Cable TV. These days, you don't have to foot a hefty cable bill when your child can catch the latest movies and TV shows online. Hulu.com, Veoh.com and Fancast.com let you download current TV shows for free. The movies offered on these sites are slightly old, but you can get a Netflix DVD-rental subscription for as little as $5 a month. For $9 a month, you get unlimited DVD rentals, plus on-demand streaming to your computer or TV through a Web-enabled device, such as an Xbox 360 or a TiVo HD.
A car. In a nine-month academic year, according to AAA, the average new sedan driven 10,000 miles would rack up more than $5,600 in expenses, including costs for gas, standard maintenance and insurance. Parking permits and any tickets or breakdowns would, of course, add even more to the bill. Along with saving you or your child from these expenses, keeping the car parked at home could lower insurance premiums.
A credit card. The average freshman amassed more than $2,000 in credit-card debt during the 2007-08 academic year. Starting in February 2010, Uncle Sam will try to help rein in that first-year frivolity with stricter credit-card rules: Anyone younger than 21 will need to prove his or her ability to repay any debts or have a parent (or someone else 21 or older) co-sign card applications.
ATM fees. If your child holds an account with your hometown bank, she may end up spending $3.50 on average every time she withdraws money from an out-of-network ATM. For some banks, it can be as high as $5 per transaction. If she withdraws money, say, once a week, she could spend up to $260 a year on fees.
Open an account for your child at a bank that is close to campus and has nationwide coverage. Or consider opening an online checking account with a bank that doesn't charge ATM fees or that refunds ATM surcharges by other banks. Be sure to read the fine print: Some of these banks do not refund ATM fees beyond a certain amount or require the account holder to maintain a minimum account balance every month. When choosing a bank, also find out whether it's easy to transfer funds online from your account to hers. This will save you from having to mail checks.
Another option is to open an account with a credit union belonging to a surcharge-free network.
Campus health insurance. If you have family health coverage, your child may still be covered under that plan when he goes to college. If your plan does not cover out-of-network costs, a campus health-insurance plan may be a more cost-effective option. Be careful, though: Some college policies have low coverage maximums, which could leave your child with thousands of dollars in uninsured expenses.
Big meal plan. Brain food is important, but avoid loading up your child's meal account with enough money to feed the football team by researching the campus rules carefully. Each university has its own meal plan, whether set up for a certain number of meals per day or a certain amount of money per semester. Often, the money does not roll over from year to year -- if you don't use the money, you lose it. Best to start low and see how much your student uses. Many colleges will give you the opportunity to replenish the meal plan midyear.
You could also supplement your kid's meal plan with gift cards to the local grocery (or the local pizza joint). Or you can buy gift cards at GiftCertificates.com.
Private loans. The high cost of higher education makes it hard to avoid student loans, but you should avoid private student loans. They usually carry variable rates (as opposed to the fixed rates of federal loans), have fewer repayment options and allow students to rack up high balances. See Be Wary of Private Student Loans for more.
You still have time to apply for federal student loans to cover the bills this school year. And look for scholarships -- they're easier to get than you might think.
