"Bought for" or "Purchased for"

Either one is acceptable. However, you, your girlfriend and your girlfriend's mother should be horsewhipped for ignoring that you ended a sentence with a preposition.

Ending a sentence in a preposition is only incorrect if the preposition is extraneous. Turn the light on for example is perfectly acceptable. Where are you at, is not because where are you asks the same question. You could not say how much was the home bought, because it would not make sense. It is a myth that you can not end any form of sentence in a preposition.

To the original poster:
This semantics game seems to be a bit of a power struggle, IMHO. I say just ignore it.

That being said...maybe they are thinking too critically (pissy) about some technical issue - maybe about how much they paid for the house itself vs how much extras added on by the bank and closing costs. Do you know what I mean? The idea could be akin to the difference in how much they negotiated with this seller (reducing the asking price down to final closing price)...vs how much the bank, lawyers fees and home inspection, etc., added on to the total. I'm purely guessing on this.

Either way...a relatively simple matter became argumentative unnecessarily (by them).

(Setanta is adding levity - just being humorous.)

It was much simpler than that. The mother had us go to a showcase house party in place of herself. When We returned from the party I asked the mother how much the home was bought for. I agree that it was unnecessarily argumentative. I Love my girlfriend to death but she can be somewhat pedantic in these situations. I am just curious to find out if my grammar was in all actuality that incorrect.

FWIW, I'm not a grammar expert...just a native user of the language for 63 years and a former technical writer. This puts me somewhere in the middle of mediocrity of expertise. I see nothing wrong with the grammar. This is their pedantic struggle. Don't get sucked in. Smile and think lovely thoughts. however, were it me, I'd push back by saying "Really? This is about my grammar?" or some such..or like I wrote...just smile.

To buy is to purchase; to purchase is to buy. They mean the same thing. You can buy a loaf of bread, a car, a plane ticket, a house, a farm, a company, a ship, a fleet of jet planes. You can also purchase these things. The word purchase is more formal and is more likely to be found in business, legal and financial documents such as real estate literature, contracts, accounts, etc.

It is very bad manners to correct someone in that way, even if a mistake has been made. You could try asking your girlfriend why she chose to attack you in that way. You could consider whether someone else might be kinder to you.

Is humor difficult for you?

It's been obvious for some time that you don't know what humility is.

CJ, why are you thread stalking Setanta?

Ah-hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha . . .

Leaving aside that you apparently don't know what arrogant means, the ideas of you being humble and of you scaring anyone are really hilarious. Thanks for the laugh, chump.

Boy that looks an awful lot like arrogance.

Thanks for the irony. Or is that your built in hypocrisy?