Hello,

I want to say that I bought the goods at a very low price.

The goods were a rip off.

Is this correct? Do I have to put an article there?


Thanks a lot!^^

Okay, my friend. First of all, I want to be sure I understand the situation correctly. If you're happy about the fact that you bought those goods at a very low price, the expression we'd say is the goods were a steal. This means you think they were actually worth a lot more money than you had to pay.

The expression a rip-off means receiving something inferior, something of much less quality than you expected or that you paid for. So if you say The goods were a rip-off, it means you're very unhappy with what you got and you feel cheated.

As for the phrase itself, yes, you need to use the indefinite article in this sentence, and please note that you need a hyphen to connect rip and off to make them one compound noun.