money pit
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.25 in modern English
15
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
2
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A possession or financial commitment, especially a building or vehicle, that creates substantial ongoing expenses, especially one whose costs are considered to be unsustainable.
name
A complicated, seemingly man-made excavation on Oak Island in Nova Scotia, Canada, rumored to contain pirate treasure and which has been repeatedly and unsuccessfully probed at great expense.
Informal
Example Sentences
- "[T]he district does not want to hold on to the nearly 50-year old^([sic]) school for very much longer, as it has outlived its usefulness and has become a money pit."
- "Critics lambasted the building's design, the art collection and Mr. Hartford, whose gallery became a money pit. Within a year he was nosing around for a partner or buyer."
- "Close to two decades past deadline and now carrying a projected $100 billion price tag, it has not returned a lick of good science — nor is it likely to."
- "In 1896 . . . work was again started with two engines and steam pumps, with the intention of pumping out the "money pit"."
- "They sank twenty shafts in a ring round the central money pit, and drove tunnels endlessly in the hope of intercepting the underground channel and so draining the treasure shaft."
- "Edward Reichert, a New Yorker, was planning "a gigantic project" . . . to move in power excavation equipment to seek the storied "money pit"."
Usage
Inflected Forms
money pits (plural)
the money pit (canonical)