# I wish you would have/had bought a car



## bimbo1973

I have a doubt about these structures:

I wish you would have bought a car
I wish you had bought a car

What´s the difference?
Thanks


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## Bevj

Hola
Por favor dinos qué quieres decir en español y explica la situación en que se usa la frase.


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## donbill

The first sentence, "I wish you would have bought the car," is incorrect.
The second is correct.

En español no se puede decir **Ojalá (que) habría comprado un carro* o **Si habría comprado un carro no tendría que caminar tanto. *Es esencialmente lo mismo en inglés. Es incorrecto decir **If you would have bought a car, you wouldn't have to walk so much. *Hay que decir *If you had bought a car, you wouldn't have to walk so much.*

El error es muy común en inglés.


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## gengo

donbill said:


> El error es muy común en inglés.



So common.  It is a pet peeve of mine.

Bimbo1973, both of these:
     I wish you would have bought a car
     I wish you had bought a car
translate the same into Spanish, Ojalá hubieras comprado un coche, but only the second one is correct, as Donbill says.


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## bimbo1973

Me gustaría saber que diferencia gramatical existe. En que contexto se usa I wish I had bought a car y I wish I would have bought a car. Las dos se refieren al pasado pero no se distinguir cuando usar uno u otro


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## Bevj

Tal como te han explicado, no se usa 'I wish I would have bought a car' en ningún contexto, porque es incorrecto.


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## Agró

bimbo1973 said:


> Me gustaría saber que diferencia gramatical existe. En que contexto se usa I wish I had bought a car y I wish I would have bought a car. Las dos se refieren al pasado pero no se distinguir cuando usar uno u otro


I wish I had bought a car: Ojalá *hubiera/hubiese* comprado un coche.  
I wish I would have bought a car: Ojalá *habría *comprado un coche.


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## bimbo1973

Ok. Gracias


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## SevenDays

bimbo1973 said:


> Me gustaría saber que diferencia gramatical existe. En que contexto se usa I wish I had bought a car y I wish I would have bought a car. Las dos se refieren al pasado pero no se distinguir cuando usar uno u otro



Ya ves que la versión con "would have" no es de mucho agrado, y se considera "incorrecta" o "non-standard" (como se dice en muchos libros de gramática), pero "would have" es bastante común, por lo menos en AE. Entonces, ¿vale decir que es una construcción "incorrecta"? Bueno, no vamos a tener una respuesta definitiva aquí en WR; por lo tanto, me voy a enfocar en tu pregunta (la diferencia gramatical), y en una explicación de su uso.

Gramaticalmente, "wish" require un complemento que sea _contrary to fact. _Ambas formas ("would have + participio" y "had + participio") cumplen con ese requisito, pues ambas se refieren a algo que no ocurrió. Ahora bien, la diferencia gramatical radica en la forma en que ambas formas se refieren al "tiempo pasado." _had bought _lo hace con un *past tense *("had"), mientras que _would have bought _lo hace con una *perfective construction*. Esta construcción perfectiva no tiene un "past tense," pero se refiere a la acción de "comprar un coche" como completa/acabada. Dicho de otra manera, en "would have bought," es el _aspecto perfectivo _de la frase lo que se refiere al "tiempo pasado."

¿Cómo se explica el uso de "would have bought"? _Would _es un _verbo modal, _y estos verbos siempre introducen _modalidad_. La modalidad simplemente se refiere al punto de vista del hablante. En este caso, "would" se refiere a _volition/intencionalidad; _con "would," hay mayor involucración (emocional) por parte del hablante en el contenido del mensaje. Ahora la diferencia ya no es solamente _gramatical_; también es _semántica_ y _pragmática_.

Sié hay una restricción, será temporal. La construcción tiene un verbo en presente ("have"), y por lo tanto _would have bought _tiene más sentido si el "pasado" al que se refiere es _reciente_ y por lo tanto más ligado al "presente" (el momento en que se dice la frase).

También te en cuenta un factor fonológico: en el habla, es muy común que _I wish I *would have* bought _se pronuncie _I wish I*'d'a* bought a car, _y que la contracción *'d'a* se interprete como *had have* que para muchos es aún más impugnable (aunque es admisible en ciertos dialectos)_._

En fin, si quieres evitarte problemas, quédate con _I wish I had bought a car_; por lo menos no tedrás que justificarla.


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## gengo

SevenDays said:


> ... pero "would have" es bastante común, por lo menos en AE. Entonces, ¿vale decir que es una construcción "incorrecta"?



Yes, certainly.  I'm not saying this to be a prescriptivist, but we must have some rules in language.  The fact is that many English speakers (and possibly more so among Americans) do not really know their native grammar very well, and make many mistakes.  In a language forum such as this, it's important to teach people the correct way to say something, and when necessary, add that natives may say it incorrectly.


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## donbill

Like gengo, I am not a proponent of strictly prescriptive grammar, and I realize that that the terms "correct" and "incorrect" are frequently given much more importance than they deserve. Nevertheless, I cringe just a little every time I hear someone say sentences like _"*If I would have left earlier, I would have arrived on time."_ I'm sure that careful native speakers of Spanish cringe when they hear the less than elegant _"*Si habría salido temprano, habría llegado a tiempo."_ Both of the "incorrect" sentences are understandable, but they depart from the norm that careful speakers observe.


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## Agró

donbill said:


> _*Si habría salido temprano, habría llegado a tiempo."_


Eso y _*Si saldría temprano, llegaría a tiempo" _es lo que muchísima gente (incluida gente con estudios superiores) usa en mi región y en algunas de las que limitan con ella. Es incorrecto, pero tengo que vivir con ello.


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## Nomenclature

Yo sí digo "I wish you would have bought the car". No me complico. La manera en que la digo es generalizada América del Norte. Digamos que si un dos por ciento de la población lo considera un error e independientemente un tres por ciento está en foros de lenguas (alto eh ) entonces de ese primer grupo todos están en foros de lenguas. O sea, la muestra de respuestas acá es sesgada.

Suena bien de la manera "correcta" también. Pero la "incorrecta" es más común o si no lo es creo que en 30 años lo será. Creo que "Si hubieras ganado la lotería, hubieras sido rico" es el "error" más extendido en español pero esto me parece aún más arraigado. Casi al nivel de "who/whom".


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## donbill

Nomenclature said:


> Creo que "Si hubieras ganado la lotería, hubieras sido rico" es el "error" más extendido en español pero esto me parece aún más arraigado. Casi al nivel de "who/whom".



Interesante tu observación, Nomenclature. ¿Quieres comentar sobre el error "más extendido" que has mencionado?

Un saludo


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## TheCrociato91

This is probably going to be off topic, but I don't see any mistake in Nomenclature's example. Using the past subjunctive where you might expect a past conditional (would have ...) in English is _not _a mistake in Spanish. I think there might about seven hundred threads on that topic.

twitter.com/RAEinforma/status/1185465871281676289 (with links to DPD and NGLE)


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## User With No Name

Nomenclature said:


> "Si hubieras ganado la lotería, hubieras sido rico"


Si no me equivoco (y perdónenme por no poder encontrar la referencia), el RAE acepta ese tipo de oraciones, por mucho que yo prefiero "habrías sido".


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## donbill

TheCrociato91 said:


> This is probably going to be off topic, but I don't see any mistake in Nomenclature's example. Using the past subjunctive where you might expect a past conditional (would have ...) in English is _not _a mistake in Spanish. I think there might about seven hundred threads on that topic.
> 
> twitter.com/RAEinforma/status/1185465871281676289 (with links to DPD and NGLE)


Thanks for the response. I agree with you. And there are many threads on the topic.

Borrego, Ascencio and Prieto, in _El subjuntivo: valores y usos, _p. 160, state that in the prótasis (si-clause), the pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo can be followed in the apódosis (result clause) by either the condicional perfecto or the pluscuamperfecto de subjuntivo.

I confess that I consistently use the conditional perfect, but I suppose that's just my desire as a non-native to simplify.


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## gengo

Nomenclature said:


> Suena bien de la manera "correcta" también. Pero la "incorrecta" es más común



Not by a long shot.  Unlike other common mistakes such as lay versus lie, which are indeed so prevalent as to be arguably acceptable (not by me, of course), this misuse of "would have" is not nearly as prevalent among the educated speakers I know.  To me, it is a red flag indicating either a lack of education or a lack of interest in grammar.  You are obviously well educated about grammar, so I'm surprised to hear you say this.


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## CVRreborn

gengo said:


> The fact is that many English speakers (and possibly more so among Americans) do not really know their native grammar very well, and make many mistakes.  In a language forum such as this, it's important to teach people the correct way to say something, and when necessary, add that natives may say it incorrectly.





donbill said:


> I cringe just a little every time I hear someone say sentences like _"*If I would have left earlier, I would have arrived on time."_



Very much agree with both of these comments. This also happens an unbelievable amount in BrEn too. So much so that that I sometimes speak grammatically incorrect English, despite being fully aware of the fact that what i'm saying is incorrect. For example, and this is probably the most common error of all in my opinion, instead of saying (the grammatically correct) '_if I *were *you' _I would probably say '_if I *was* you' _

This is because it is so normal to speak grammatically incorrectly, that when you do use the correct phrase it sounds wrong. At least that's how it is in my friendship group, who are privately educated, which makes me think that it has nothing to do with education, but it rather highlights the fact that very very few English people have an idea of how their own language works.


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## Luchadorconan

gengo said:


> Not by a long shot.  Unlike other common mistakes such as lay versus lie, which are indeed so prevalent as to be arguably acceptable (not by me, of course), this misuse of "would have" is not nearly as prevalent among the educated speakers I know.  To me, it is a red flag indicating either a lack of education or a lack of interest in grammar.  You are obviously well educated about grammar, so I'm surprised to hear you say this.


Could you explain why it's wrong?


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## gengo

Luchadorconan said:


> Could you explain why it's wrong?



Sure.  "I wish" takes the subjunctive, and in the sentence of this thread, it is the past subjunctive, which is "had."  "Would have" is a conditional construction, which doesn't fit in this sentence.

I wish you had bought a car.  (subjunctive, because a wish is hypothetical by definition)
You would have bought a car if you had saved your money.  (conditional; the condition to having bought a car was saving money)


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## Nomenclature

I actually thought about this a bit more before going to bed last night and I think that the way that the reason that I got so up in arms about the whole thing (sorry ) is that to me there is a slight difference in meaning and that the two have different connotations. I could be wrong but I think that I use "would have" for totally unreal events and "had" for events that could have happened. I know that doesn't make sense so I'll explain.

Let's take the original sentence as an example. "*I wish you would have/had bought a car"*. 

Let's call the person that I'm talking to Luisa. I am with Luisa in the middle of the desert and her 40 year-old car breaks down.

If, before our trip, Luisa went to the car dealership, filled out loads of paperwork with the clear intention of getting a car, and only balked when it came time to write the final signature, then I might say "I wish you *had bought* the car". 

If, on the other hand, Luisa never had any intention of buying a car nor has it crossed her mind; she loves her current car and never went to a dealership. I might say "I wish you _*would have bought*_ a new car". My wish is very contrary-to-the-fact.

Two other examples

If I'm talking to a teammate about a game we lost by one goal and in the final minute he was inches from scoring only to see his effort denied by heroics from the opposition goalie I would say "I wish *you had* scored".

If it's my 18th birthday and my parents tell me that I'm adopted, I could say "I wish you* would have told* me earlier". They had no intention to do so and clearly had planned to do it like this. My wish is contrary to what they wanted. 

To be fair, in practice, I (and others) absolutely say things that contradict this explanation, but I do think this tendency exists.


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## Forero

I can see that "I wish you would have bought a car" is grammatical, and even that it has multiple possible interpretations, depending on context.

And the difference is hard to translate even when we know what the person means.

It does bother me when someone says that sentence when all they mean is "I wish you had bought a car". I don't like being misled and having to work out that the speaker did not mean what they said.


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## donbill

Greetings, Forero!

I have read your WR posts for years and have always found them to be enlightening. #23, above, however, mystifies me. I don't see how it's grammatical. I respect your expertise too much to say that it isn't, but I don't see it.

I wish you could have bought the car.
I wish you had bought the car.
I wish you would have bought the car. (in my humble opinion)

But, in fact, none of this matters much in the proverbial "scheme of things." I suppose it means that we must be doing pretty well if we're able to devote so much time to debating the topic.

Stay safe and well


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## gengo

Forero said:


> I can see that "I wish you would have bought a car" is grammatical



Here is a grammar website that discusses this.  And here is a short quotation.

The same mistake occurs with the verb “wish.” You can’t use the conditional perfect when wishing something had happened; you again need the past perfect.

*Correct: *_I wish I had known._
*Incorrect:* _I wish I would have known._
*Correct:* _I wish you had told me._
*Incorrect:* _I wish you would have told me._
*Correct:* _We wish they had been honest._
*Incorrect:* _We wish they would have been honest._


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## Forero

donbill said:


> Greetings, Forero!
> 
> I have read your WR posts for years and have always found them to be enlightening. #23, above, however, mystifies me. I don't see how it's grammatical. I respect your expertise too much to say that it isn't, but I don't see it.
> 
> I wish you could have bought the car.
> I wish you had bought the car.
> I wish you would have bought the car. (in my humble opinion)
> 
> But, in fact, none of this matters much in the proverbial "scheme of things." I suppose it means that we must be doing pretty well if we're able to devote so much time to debating the topic.
> 
> Stay safe and well


"I wish you would have bought the car" works if the question is not whether the person did buy the car but whether the person would buy the car.

In Nomenclature's example context, "Luisa wouldn't buy the car" makes sense. If I wish it were not so, I could say "Luisa, I wish you would have bought the car."

Just as, in a different context, "Luisa couldn't buy the car" makes sense, and if I wish that weren't so, I could say "Luisa, I wish you could have bought the car."

You stay safe and well too, and I wish the same for everyone on these forums.


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