19

I want to know what is the opposite of 'owe'. For example,

I owe you $10

If I want to say the opposite I have to reverse it and say,

you owe me $10

But sometimes I feel I should start with 'I' not 'you'.

Another example, if we said,

John owes Peter $100

We can say also that,

Peter xxx John $100

to mean the exact thing.

What is the proper word to replace xxx?

Justin
  • 10,186
Robert
  • 301
  • 2
    'Peter was into John for a Benny.' But this is ambiguous (and slang). – Edwin Ashworth Feb 28 '21 at 19:29
  • Probably similar to the Spanish prestar... – Cascabel_StandWithUkraine_ Feb 28 '21 at 20:17
  • Related: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/543553/owe-and-own-sound-similar-but-have-nearly-opposite-meanings – StayOnTarget Mar 01 '21 at 14:22
  • 8
    I’m voting to close this question; if a simple passivisation is the most upvoted answer, and 'I don't think there's a single word that expresses the opposite relationship' probably the most accurate, this does not belong on ELU. – Edwin Ashworth Mar 01 '21 at 15:35
  • 1
    Re: @EdwinAshworth's answer. "A Benny" is an Americanism. Benjamin Franklin's image appears on the $100 bill. I'd never heard _A Benny" before, but I'm assuming that is the root. Similar American expressions include: "It's all about the Benjamins" or "Show me the Benjamins" – Flydog57 Mar 01 '21 at 16:47
  • 7
    @EdwinAshworth - doesn’t belong to ELU? 8 answers and still users disagree. Not as simple as it appears. – user 66974 Mar 01 '21 at 19:49
  • 1
    "I'm expecting $5 from you". – Kaz Mar 01 '21 at 21:54
  • 7
    @EdwinAshworth: Why??? "There's no such word" is a perfectly valid answer, and it's much more informative than no answer at all. – Eric Duminil Mar 02 '21 at 07:30
  • @Eric Duminil 'I don't think there's a single word' is unacceptable. I haven't seen 'There's no such word', and would be astounded to see supporting evidence to that effect. Note that OP has offered no reasonable research ( a link to a thesaurus listing 'antonyms', say). – Edwin Ashworth Mar 02 '21 at 13:05
  • 4
    @EdwinAshworth: I agree. "There doesn't seem to be a single word for this" strikes me as a useful fact that is worth having on this site. – JonathanZ Mar 02 '21 at 18:23
  • Facetious answer: own. Example: Peter owns John's $100. – Nayuki Mar 02 '21 at 20:41

9 Answers9

29

You can use the expression “be owed”:

Peter is owed $100 by John.

user 66974
  • 67,349
  • 2
    Would you say “from John” or “by John” ? The second sounds more natural to me, though that may be just me ?!? – k1eran Feb 28 '21 at 21:58
  • 17
    @k1eran "Owed £10 by John" is much more common. So much more common that I would say that "from John" is probably incorrect. – BoldBen Feb 28 '21 at 22:38
  • 2
    @BoldBen Interesting - I have the opposite intuition, esp. for something besides money "I am owed a letter *by/from John." – Azor Ahai -him- Mar 01 '21 at 17:36
  • 4
    https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=owed+NOUN+from%2Cowed+NOUN+by&year_start=1800&year_end=2019&corpus=28&smoothing=3 "by" > "from" in both AmE and BrE, but closer in AmE, curious – Azor Ahai -him- Mar 01 '21 at 17:41
  • 1
    To my American ear, this sounds weird. I'd understand what was meant, but it sounds weird anyway. I would probably either avoid doing the inversion at all or else use a different construction like "due" or "entitled" as mentioned in other answers/comments. – Ian Mar 01 '21 at 18:49
  • @Ian Fellow American here but I wouldn't say it's weird at all. Maybe it's a regional thing. I am in Southern California. – Cave Johnson Mar 02 '21 at 00:05
  • 1
    @AzorAhai-him- In terms of a letter, email, answer, invitation and so on I would probably say "from" but in those cases I haven't lent him anything tangible, he is to generate what is 'owed'. If I was talking about a tangible consumable asset I had lent him (money, can of fuel, bag of flour, printer cartridge and so on I wouid say "by" every time). – BoldBen Mar 02 '21 at 02:10
  • 1
    I still think "by" is not great for money too – Azor Ahai -him- Mar 02 '21 at 03:14
  • @AzorAhai-him- "from" takes precedence in your example because it parses as "I am owed [a letter from John]", rather than "I am owed [a letter] [by John]". Technically, the former example doesn't state who the debtor is, it just states who wrote the letter that is owed (but you infer that the author and debtor are the same). In the latter example, John owes you a letter but it's unclear who the author is (or whether it even matters) – Flater Mar 02 '21 at 12:03
  • FWIW, this is just passive voice. – Jivan Pal Mar 02 '21 at 14:54
  • You could also use owing - "I have $10 owing from John." – Showsni Mar 02 '21 at 16:19
  • @Showsni In which dialects, that's ungrammatical in the ones I'm familiar with – Azor Ahai -him- Mar 03 '21 at 20:22
20

I owe you $10 -> You are due $10 from me; you are owed $10 by me.

PLL
  • 20,575
  • 3
  • 50
  • 103
Greybeard
  • 41,737
  • I agree with @Greybeard that there should be a 'I am/ you are' due' in the answer, but I cannot make it work as yet. –  Mar 01 '21 at 12:13
  • 1
    and "I am due £10 from you" works fine. – Anton Mar 01 '21 at 13:02
  • "are due" is technically correct, but I wouldn't call it common - at least not in my midwestern vernacular. – Joe Mar 01 '21 at 19:50
  • 6
    Are you saying "I owe you $10" is the same as "I am owed $10 by you"? If not, then it's not clear in your answer. If yes, then I would say that is incorrect. "I am owed x by you" to me means "you owe me x". – Cave Johnson Mar 01 '21 at 21:11
  • @KodosJohnson: I think we can presume that was a typo/thinko — I’ve edited to fix it. – PLL Mar 03 '21 at 14:24
10

I don't think there's a single word that expresses the opposite relationship. But instead of describing the state, you can describe the transaction that implies this state:

Peter lent John $100

However, there could be other reasons why John owes money to Peter, such as Peter performing a service for John, and now being owed the payment, or Peter winning a lawsuit against John.

Barmar
  • 20,741
  • 1
  • 38
  • 59
  • 1
    I was thinking “loaned” to replace “xxx” as an answer, but will leave it here as a comment instead since it is so similar: “Peter loaned John $100”. – OnlyF Mar 01 '21 at 15:14
  • @OnlyF They're equivalent. https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/108109/which-is-correct-i-loaned-him-some-money-or-i-lent-him-some-money – Barmar Mar 01 '21 at 15:44
  • 2
    The only issue with this is that someone can owe someone else without an initial act of lending. For instance, person A might owe person B for damages. – TaliesinMerlin Mar 01 '21 at 18:51
  • 2
    @TaliesinMerlin Good point. There are also less explicit loans, such as Peter buying something on John's behalf, now John owes him the money in return for the purchase. – Barmar Mar 01 '21 at 19:10
  • "lent" doesn't describe the current debt situation, only describing the event of lending. If you say "lent", I have no idea whether or not the debt was repaid, whereas "owes" expresses this unambiguously. Additionally "owing" doesn't necessarily only apply to scenarios where borrowing took place. If you purchase something from me and don't pay the bill, you owe me, but I didn't lend you anything. – Tim Seguine Mar 09 '21 at 11:38
  • @TimSeguine Didn't I say all those things in my answer? – Barmar Mar 09 '21 at 17:05
  • @Barmar I didn't really find that clear, but maybe I am being weird. – Tim Seguine Mar 13 '21 at 10:12
  • @TimSeguine My last paragraph talked all about there being other reasons for owing the money. But you're right that saying that the money was lent doesn't necessarily imply that the loan hasn't been repaid. The context will often make it clear. "Why is John giving Peter $100? Because Peter lent John $100." – Barmar Mar 13 '21 at 15:37
8

I understand your question to mean that you wish to retain the same subject - verb - object order in the negative. I therefore suggest:

“I owe you £10” in negative form is “You owe me £10” (reverses subject/object order)

=

“I am entitled to £10 from you.” (Retains subject/object order, as you specify)

Entitled = having the right or permission to do something

“You are entitled to a refund.”

Collins

Anton
  • 28,634
  • 3
  • 42
  • 81
8

If A owes B something, B indebts A. This is marked in the OED as a rare usage; the Oxford English Dictionary speculates that it is inferred from the adjective indebted (indebt, v.), and early examples use this as the reflexive (meaning to put oneself in a situation of debt):

Now rare.

  1. transitive. To bring under monetary obligation; to involve in debt. (In quots. reflexive.)

  2. To bring under an obligation of any kind.

Some online dictionaries (like Merriam-Webster) list the term as archaic, but others (Lexico) treat it as current:

Cause (someone) to owe money or an obligation.

‘no generation should be able to indebt future generations’

The word has been used recently in non-reflexive ways:

It is important here to ignore the origin of this gift that never seems to indebt the receiver. (Joelle Vitiello, "Friendship in the Novels of Andree Chedid," Symposium, 49.1, 1995, COCA).

For a long time, some villages refused to accept water or electricity lines, disliking the spiderweb-like intrusion into the earth (where Muy’ingwu, the germination deity, has his dwelling), and foreseeing also that this would indebt them to non-local companies, and compromise their independence. (Peter Whiteley, "The Fire Burns Yet," Aeon, 25 November 2013).

A living donor, for instance, could be motivated [...] by a desire to indebt and manipulate someone else. (Gill and Sade, in Joseph A. Stramondo, "Seeing the forest through the trees: What the radical feminist critique of prostitution can teach us about the sale of kidneys by living suppliers," *International Journal of Feminist Approaches to Bioethics, 6.1, Spring 2013)

The article describes Chinese loans as a 'cunning' device used by Beijing to indebt poor countries and gain control over their strategic assets. (Beyongo Mukete Dynamic, "China's Power in Africa: Rhetoric and Reality." Power, 2019.)

By giving her money, he indebts her. (Karen Murree, Reading Murder in Six Major American Novels, 1994.)

Thus the following usage would be acceptable, even if quirky:

Peter indebts John for $100.

TaliesinMerlin
  • 40,528
  • 1
    A few examples don't confer acceptability. – Edwin Ashworth Mar 01 '21 at 19:13
  • 4
    Interesting term, M-W says it is archaic. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/indebt – user 66974 Mar 01 '21 at 19:15
  • 1
    @EdwinAshworth That is three current and published examples along with a dictionary entry. How much more would be sufficient for your standard of "acceptability"? – TaliesinMerlin Mar 01 '21 at 19:16
  • 4
    I'd like you to quote OED accurately, caveats and all, for a start. M-W says it is archaic, so I'd say 'Peter indebts John for $100' is quirky at best rather than 'acceptable'. OP's register is "I owe you $10". – Edwin Ashworth Mar 01 '21 at 19:26
  • Curiously indebt is defined only by M-W and Lexico AFAIK and other sources just refer to M-W definition. Don’t know about the OED – user 66974 Mar 01 '21 at 19:37
  • Thank you both. I have noted even more explicitly that the OED calls it rare and that Merriam-Webster calls it archaic. That said, the number of results I'm seeing suggests that the word is used in both colloquial and published sources, which leads me to suspect that the dictionary entries may not fully reflect current usage. The word is quirky, sure, but easily understood. – TaliesinMerlin Mar 01 '21 at 19:41
  • 4
    “Cause someone to owe” and “be owed by someone” are not the same kind of thing and this word does not fill the niche of the question. – Michael Homer Mar 02 '21 at 04:33
  • This is an interesting related word, but as @MichaelHomer says, it doesn’t mean quite what the answer says it does. The subject of indebts is whoever or whatever caused the debt, not necessarily the person the debt is owed to. If I take £10 from my mother’s purse and then tell her I’ve borrowed it, she has not indebted me — I have indebted myself. – PLL Mar 03 '21 at 14:30
  • 1
    While I've never heard "indebts", "being indebted" is something I've heard many times. – ikegami Mar 04 '21 at 03:34
5

This isn't just a problem with the word "owe." The relevant part of the sentence structure is: subject, verb, direct object. The question implies that there one can construct the opposite, i.e. direct object, verb, subject and still make sense, each a single word. I'm not a grammarian, but believe that this is not possible. John hit Peter. Peter ??? John. Etc.

DaveClark
  • 79
  • 1
    There is the occasional exception (The Browns visited Al / Al hosted the Browns), and reciprocal verbs (Al met Ali / Ali met Al), but you're quite right that this is a strange request. – Edwin Ashworth Mar 01 '21 at 17:15
  • +1 The best I can come up with is "Peter received a blow from John", which doesn't have the desired structure. – WaterMolecule Mar 01 '21 at 21:51
3

From a finance perspective:

Peter credited John $100

From https://www.britannica.com/topic/credit:

Credit, transaction between two parties in which one (the creditor or lender) supplies money, goods, services, or securities in return for a promised future payment by the other (the debtor or borrower).

MonkeyZeus
  • 3,638
  • 1
  • 11
  • 22
  • Your definition is of the noun. And are you saying that 'Peter credited John $100' is another way of saying 'John owed Peter $100' (which OP has requested)? – Edwin Ashworth Mar 02 '21 at 19:22
  • @EdwinAshworth My goal was to replace xxx without altering the surrounding sentence. It had to be changed to a past-tense verb because Peter credit John $100 does not sound right. – MonkeyZeus Mar 02 '21 at 19:48
  • But 'Peter credited John $100' sounds unnatural to my British ears. It may be better in the US, but it certainly doesn't mean exactly the same as 'John owed/s Peter $100'. It may be a debt being repaid by Peter. – Edwin Ashworth Mar 03 '21 at 11:38
  • 'Sounds like' John could have received a gift from Peter. This do not imply there was a debt, –  Mar 03 '21 at 14:34
  • @Huggy The question is definitely one of those "What's the opposite of pancake?". Sadly it's an XY problem because of how it's worded. – MonkeyZeus Mar 03 '21 at 14:45
  • @MonkeyZeus - TeeHee! (pre-lol to me). Does this site ever revoke answers (unanswer, deanswer answers that are 'questionable?') Being facetious here –  Mar 03 '21 at 14:55
  • 1
    This won't do. If John owes Peter, John is under an obligation to repay Peter (I paraphrased the definition in Chambers, there). The repayment hasn't happened yet. "Peter credited John some money" implies that Peter gave John some money rather than vice versa, and that the payment has already happened, and fails to imply an obligation to repay in the future. – Rosie F Mar 03 '21 at 16:37
3

I am 'due' one-hundred dollars means that someone 'owes' you the money.

Arluin
  • 431
3

"is indebted to" e.g. Peter is indebted to John for $100

Angus Walker
  • 131
  • The question was asking for a single word and indebts has already been given as an answer. – KillingTime Mar 02 '21 at 07:28
  • @KillingTime This is the most idiomatic way to say what the OP wants. The fact that it is not one word is too bad for him (we can't change the way the language works). He doesn't specifically request a single word except for using the question tag, rather implicitly assumes there is one. The "indebts" answer is slightly ridiculous and unrelated to this one. – Tim Seguine Mar 09 '21 at 11:51