a $1 million beach apartment/ $ 50,000 worth of furniture

[marcogaiotto]

Hello! Can you help me, please?
"A $ 1 million beach apartment" ---> one million dollars or dollar beach apartment?
"$ 50,000 worth of furniture" ---> fifty thousand dollars or dollar worth furniture?
I'd say "one million dollar beach apartment", as I say "ten-year-old girl", for example. Thank you in advance!

 

[Andygc]

You appear to know the answer for the apartment. A million-dollar apartment. 50 thousand dollars' worth of furniture. Note the hyphen and the possessive.

 

[Egmont]

Also, please note that there should be no space between $ and the number. In English we write "$50,000," not "$ 50,000." (There are some accounting data formats in which the currency symbol is placed at the far left of a spreadsheet cell, but that's a separate topic.)

 

[marcogaiotto]

Thanks a lot...as a matter of fact, the text says "$ 50,000 worth of furniture" with no possessive and "A $ 1 million beach apartment" with no hyphen...So I should say "dollars worth" and "a million dollar beach apartment", shouldn't I? Thanks a lot to all of you!

 

[dojibear]

"A $ 1 million beach apartment" ---> one million dollars or dollar beach apartment?

In AE, I would read the quoted text as "A one million dollar beach apartment". I would not omit A or one in this phrase, since both are in the written text.

The phrase "a million dollar beach apartment" is also common. This omits the number (one), because "a" has the meaning "one". This can only be done when the number happens to be 1. As soon as you change the number, you can't combine "A" and the number as a single word:

"A $ 3 million beach apartment" ==> "A three million dollar beach apartment".

Personally I don't combine them, even when the number is 1. I've heard both phrases too many times in AE:

"A million dollar beach apartment".
"A one million dollar beach apartment".

 

[marcogaiotto]

I do agree...I'd say "a one million dollar apartment", dojibear! Please, can you confirm that I'm not making a mistake while saying "fifty thousand dollars worth" with the letter "s" in "dollars"? Thanks a lot!

 

[Keith Bradford]

No, it needs to be dollars' worth. See #2.

 

[marcogaiotto]

Keith, thank you! I meant "fifty thousand dollars worth" as pronunciation: the letter "s" has to be pronounced, isn't it? Thank you once again!

 

[Keith Bradford]

Yes indeed, the 's' has to be pronounced. And the apostrophe has to be written too.

 

[marcogaiotto]