pay / cost / spend

Question

Do the following sentences have the same meaning? Are they all grammatically correct? Which is more common?

How much did you pay for the book?

How much did it cost you to buy the book?

How much did the book cost you?

How much was the book?

How much did you spend on the book?

How much did you spend buying the book?

Also, if my friend bought a book, should I ask "How much was the book?" or "How much is the book?"

Thanks in advance.

Mister Micawber · Accepted Answer

.
They are all grammatical and essentially synonymous. I have deleted the awkward or redundant ones.

How much did you pay for the book?
How much did the book cost you?
How much was the book?-- This is the most common version.
How much did you spend on the book?

Also, if your friend bought a book: "How much was the book?"

BarbaraPA · Answer

Hi hsiaoyunh,

I know this seems like a simple question, but it's not.

"How much did the book cost?" is a slightly different question than "How much did the book cost you?"

Cost is a feature of the book. The cost to a person is ... well, personal. It emphasizes the impact on the purchasers. A week's salary, my spending money for the month, etc.

Spend and pay are is actions. It emphasizes what the person did to acquire the book.

Also, it's actually not common to ask what people spent on something, so if you're asking, you're asking for a specific reason.

For example, if I may want to but it too, I may say "Oh, that sounds like a great book. Do you mind if I ask how much it cost?" or "I plan to buy that book for John for his birthday. How much did it cost?" Generally, it's considered rude where I live to ask about the price of things.

But there are some people who can't resist telling you that you spent too much money or that they could have gotten a better price. That's when you'd use the word "spend." "How much did you spend on that new book? Because I just got it myself at [store X] and you won't believe the deal I got!"

The same goes for pay. "How much did you pay? Oh, your poor thing. If only you'd asked me, I could have told you that Bookbinder's is selling it for half that amount!"

Hsiaoyunh · Answer

So, if I'm in a store and I want to buy a book, I can ask "How much is the book?" or "How much does the book cost?"
They are both neutral. But if the questions involve "cost you", "pay" or "spend", they are kind of personal and we should be careful when using them except for a specific reason. Is this correct?

Also, because the examples I used were all talking about an object, I wonder if I replace the object with an action, will the sentence patterns still work? Does anything sound awkward to you? Which is more common?

How much did you pay for building the house?

How much did it cost you to build the house?

How much did building the house cost you?

How much did you spend building the house?

How much was the house?

How much did you spend on the house?

(I feel like that the last two sound like instead of building a house, the person bought one.)

Cool Breeze · Answer

hsiaoyunhSo, if I'm in a store and I want to buy a book, I can ask "How much is the book?" or "How much does the book cost?"

I'll **** in if I may. In the context and locale you have provided both your questions sound fine to me. As to the rest, they are all grammatical and could be uttered in the right context. Without context, it's impossible to say anything about how natural they sound. English is a language of fixed pharases and allof your phrases are certainly fixed enough to be used in the right place at the right time.

CB

pay / cost / spend

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