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Glite Dictionary
to sell a bill of goods

to sell a bill of goods

2 9.0
To trick someone by making something false seem valuable
  • idiom
  • Informal
translation icon : engañar
  • Liberals got sold a bill of goods with Obama.

The bottom line is we have been sold a bill of goods.

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Examples

  • They were sold a bill of goods by a con man!

    Blog text (11)

  • Both pairs of homeowners were sold a bill of goods by bank employees, only to end up trapped.

    Blog text (1)

  • Looks like we were sold a bill of goods by the same salesman.

    Lucky Number Slevin (2006)

  • That's where we have been sold a bill of goods where people say, yeah, these are good words, What do you think?

    Evan Carmichael

  • I explained that people are also concerned that they're being sold a bill of goods that is not as promised.

    Blog text (21)

  • Something that the common reader can come away from saying, "I've been sold a bill of goods."

    Blog text (27)

  • We have been sold a bill of goods and think we are serving God by our efforts to change the moral structure of a fallen culture; we have only deceived ourselves.

    Blog text (31)

  • Many of them are destined to wake up one day and be very disillusioned, realizing that they have been lied to and sold a bill of goods if everything doesn't turn out as they were promised it would.

    Blog text (17)

  • Many consumers felt that they were sold a bill of goods when the product did not meet their expectations.

  • It's easy to be sold a bill of goods if you're not careful about the promises being made.

Synonyms

to con
vsto sell a bill of goods
  • Informal
61 7.3

To trick someone into giving their money or things

persuades people to accept something false as if it had value
to con out of
vsto sell a bill of goods
  • Slang
6 8.1

To trick someone into giving you their money or other things

persuades people to accept false or worthless things as valuable
to foist off
vsto sell a bill of goods
1 9.4

Sell fake or bad things by tricking someone

uses persuasion to make any false thing seem valuable

Antonyms

honesty
365 1.0

Being truthful and fair in what you say and do

How Deceptive

to sell a bill of goods
  • Informal
2 9.0
to mislead
87 3.9

Surface Forms

sell a bill of goods infinitive

Morphology

sell + a + bill + of + good

The literal constituents ('sell' + 'bill' + 'goods') point to a commercial transaction (selling merchandise or an invoice), so a learner who only knows the words would most likely interpret it literally. The idiomatic meaning 'to deceive or mislead' is a language-specific idiom and is not predictable from the parts without cultural or phraseological knowledge, so B1 learners would not reliably infer it.

Etymology

Sell a bill of goods may come from old traders who gave buyers a paper list called a bill that named the goods, while the actual items were poor or fake. So, to sell someone a bill of goods means 'to deceive' someone by making something bad seem good.