What's the best / most interesting thing to do with old CFA textbooks?

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lillilland

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I’ve got both the official CFA texts and Schweser notes for all three levels of the exams. I really don’t use the books anymore, storing them in the closet takes up a lot of space. but tossing them seems like such a waste.
What are you doing with your old notes?
I’m thinking of stacking the books together and using it as a side table, and was wondering if anyone had ideas for good uses for these books too.
- LL
 
Not very interesting, but you could always sell them to some overly ambitious person who wants to study before next year’s books come out. They come take your trash away and pay you at the same time!
 
In Australia, you get your fish & chips wrapped in old newspaper. I’d open a fish & chip shop just so I could wrap what I serve in old CFAI material. I’d get a real kick thinking about people eating my food whilst learning how to price a cross-currency swap.
 
Definitely display your current/ most recent curriculum.Otherwise who will know how many books you had to read to pass Level X/ How awesome you are?
Throw the rest. Mind you the shelf idea is quite cool.
 
  • Hi.. I think we should give books to the students who need them for exam preparation….
 
^ that’s also an idea. So far I’ve noticed what we’d cover in 1-2 weeks at university is very nicely summed up in one or two LOS in Schweser. Some classes (Stat 265 comes to mind) would have been so much easier if I had just used the quant methods book instead of desparately trying to understand anything the prof was rambling about. Donate them to the local business schools finance department or something, they can throw them in the free books bin. Not to mention it’d be a way for soon to be graduates to get an idea what the curriculum is like, before they drop $1000 on the exam.
 
Can you donate it and write off the replacement cost? Aren’t the books like $250? If you drop them off at Goodwill, can you claim market value of deduction? Come to think of it… how come I never thought of this earlier..?
 
chibwack wrote:
… Donate them to the local business schools finance department or something,…
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Exactly! I had a spare set of LIII materials which would have just gathered dust on my bookshelf.
 
After passing each level it is a very rewarding feeling to toss notes, books, flash cards in the trash for me.
 
chibwack wrote:
Donate them to the local business schools finance department or something, they can throw them in the free books bin. Not to mention it’d be a way for soon to be graduates to get an idea what the curriculum is like, before they drop $1000 on the exam.
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Did exactly that and made everyone happy, including myself.
 
Maybe there is a short-lived rewarding feeling by blowing them up, but I have kept L3 books and notes on my bookshelf. What used to be an eyesore with a feeling of disgust looking at them, has become a feeling of satisfaction now that I don’t have to study them anymore. Hell, I even open them once in a while. The feeling of “thank God I don’t have to do this again” is warm and fuzzy.
 
goes to eleven wrote:
Maybe there is a short-lived rewarding feeling by blowing them up, but I have kept L3 books and notes on my bookshelf. What used to be an eyesore with a feeling of disgust looking at them, has become a feeling of satisfaction now that I don’t have to study them anymore. Hell, I even open them once in a while. The feeling of “thank God I don’t have to do this again” is warm and fuzzy.
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happy times i imagine
 
I kept L2 and L3 for reference and actually have turned to them a few times over the years. Certainly could have found the information elsewhere, but was easy enough to just grab from my office shelf. I’m pretty sure I cited the texts in at least one instance too, so it was useful to have them.
 
Investopedia probably has all the answers you need without keeping 50lbs of textbooks.
 
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