say it: sayl
sale is a noun meaning "a particular instance of selling". It carries 5 recorded senses.
a particular instance of selling
“he has just made his first sale”
“they had to complete the sale before the banks closed”
an occasion (usually brief) for buying at specially reduced prices
“they held a sale to reduce their inventory”
“I got some great bargains at their annual sale”
the state of being purchasable; offered or exhibited for selling
“you'll find vitamin C for sale at most pharmacies”
“the new line of cars will soon be on sale”
an agreement (or contract) in which property is transferred from the seller (vendor) to the buyer (vendee) for a fixed price in money (paid or agreed to be paid by the buyer)
“the salesman faxed the sales agreement to his home office”
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for sale come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.