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Sell vs Purchase - What's the difference?

sell | purchase |

In obsolete terms the difference between sell and purchase

is that sell is a seat or stool while purchase is the act or process of seeking and obtaining something (e.g. property, etc..

As verbs the difference between sell and purchase

is that sell is to transfer goods or provide services in exchange for money while purchase is to pursue and obtain; to acquire by seeking; to gain, obtain, or acquire.

As nouns the difference between sell and purchase

is that sell is an act of selling while purchase is the act or process of seeking and obtaining something (e.g. property, etc..

sell

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) sellen, from (etyl) , Icelandic selja.

Verb

  • (intransitive) To transfer goods or provide services in exchange for money.
  • * Bible, (w) xix. 21
  • If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= A new prescription , passage=No sooner has a [synthetic] drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one. These “legal highs” are sold for the few months it takes the authorities to identify and ban them, and then the cycle begins again.}}
  • (ergative) To be sold.
  • To promote a particular viewpoint.
  • (slang) To trick, cheat, or manipulate someone.
  • * (Charles Dickens)
  • * {{quote-news, year=2011, date=January 12, author=Saj Chowdhury, work=BBC
  • , title= Liverpool 2-1 Liverpool , passage=Raul Meireles was the victim of the home side's hustling on this occasion giving the ball away to the impressive David Vaughan who slipped in Taylor-Fletcher. The striker sold Daniel Agger with the best dummy of the night before placing his shot past keeper Pepe Reina.}}
  • (professional wrestling, slang) To pretend that an opponent's blows or maneuvers are causing legitimate injury; to act.
  • Antonyms
    * buy
    Derived terms
    * sell-by date * sell-out * sell-outs * sell-through * sell down * sell down the river * sell ice to Eskimos * sell like hotcakes * sell one's soul * sell out * sell refrigerators to Eskimos * sell wolf tickets

    Quotations

    * To trick, or cheat someone. *

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An act of selling.
  • This is going to be a tough sell .
  • An easy task.
  • * 1922': What a '''sell for Lena! - (Katherine Mansfield), ''The Doll's House (Selected Stories, Oxford World's Classics paperback 2002, 354)
  • (colloquial, dated) An imposition, a cheat; a hoax.
  • * 1919 ,
  • "Of course a miracle may happen, and you may be a great painter, but you must confess the chances are a million to one against it. It'll be an awful sell if at the end you have to acknowledge you've made a hash of it."

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) selle, from (etyl) sella.

    Alternative forms

    * selle (obsolete)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (obsolete) A seat or stool.
  • (Fairfax)
  • (archaic) A saddle.
  • * 1590 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , II.ii:
  • turning to that place, in which whyleare / He left his loftie steed with golden sell , / And goodly gorgeous barbes, him found not theare [...].

    purchase

    English

    Noun

  • (obsolete) The act or process of seeking and obtaining something (e.g. property, etc.)
  • * Beaumont and Fletcher
  • I'll get meat to have thee, / Or lose my life in the purchase .
  • An individual item one has purchased.
  • The acquisition of title to, or property in, anything for a price; buying for money or its equivalent.
  • They offer a free hamburger with the purchase of a drink.
  • That which is obtained, got or acquired, in any manner, honestly or dishonestly; property; possession; acquisition.
  • That which is obtained for a price in money or its equivalent.
  • He was pleased with his latest purchase .
  • (uncountable) Any mechanical hold or advantage, applied to the raising or removing of heavy bodies, as by a lever, a tackle or capstan.
  • It is hard to get purchase on a nail without a pry bar or hammer.
  • The apparatus, tackle or device by which such mechanical advantage is gained and in nautical terminology the ratio of such a device, like a pulley, or block and tackle.
  • (rock climbing, uncountable) The amount of hold one has from an individual foothold or ledge.
  • (legal, dated) Acquisition of lands or tenements by means other than descent or inheritance, namely, by one's own act or agreement.
  • (Blackstone)

    Derived terms

    * purchase order * repurchase

    Verb

    (purchas)
  • To pursue and obtain; to acquire by seeking; to gain, obtain, or acquire.
  • * Spenser
  • that loves the thing he cannot purchase
  • * Shakespeare
  • Your accent is something finer than you could purchase in so removed a dwelling.
  • * Shakespeare
  • His faults hereditary / Rather than purchased .
  • To buy, obtain by payment of a price in money or its equivalent.
  • to purchase''' land'', ''to '''purchase a house
  • To obtain by any outlay, as of labor, danger, or sacrifice, etc.
  • to purchase favor with flattery
  • * Shakespeare
  • One poor retiring minute / Would purchase thee a thousand thousand friends.
  • To expiate by a fine or forfeit.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Not tears nor prayers shall purchase out abuses.
  • To apply to (anything) a device for obtaining a mechanical advantage; to get a purchase' upon, or apply a ' purchase to.
  • to purchase a cannon
  • To put forth effort to obtain anything; to strive; to exert oneself.
  • * Ld. Berners
  • Duke John of Brabant purchased greatly that the Earl of Flanders should have his daughter in marriage.
  • To constitute the buying power for a purchase, have a trading value.
  • ''Many aristocratic refugees' portable treasures purchased their safe passage and comfortable exile during the revolution

    Synonyms

    * (buy) procure

    Derived terms

    * purchable * purchasing agent * purchasing power