Writing: Possessive pronouns — Harder example

- [Instructor] Oliver and Theo have lived on they're parents' sailboat for over three years. So this version of they're, T-H-E-Y-apostrophe-R-E, this is a contraction for they are. They are. So let's see if it makes sense if we were to replace this. We should be able to replace the contraction with the thing that it's contracting. So let's see. Oliver and Theo have lived on they are parents' sailboat for over three years. So this clearly does not make sense. The intent isn't to write the contraction of they are, the intent is to write the possessive of they, and the possessive of they is T-H-E-I-R, not T-H-E-Y-apostrophe-R-E. These get confused all the time. I've been guilty of it when I've been typing really fast. My brain just kind of says what it sounds like instead of saying, hey, wait, wait. I need to use a one there versus another there. So T-H-E-I-R, so their parents', and then we have this apostrophe after the s. Now, you put the apostrophe after the s is if this is a plural possessive, and this is. We're talking about more than one parent. We're not talking about one parent's sailboat. We are talking about their parents' sailboats, so multiple parents' sailboats. So this is, so we would go their parents', so this one right over here. So we definitely wanna change it. We don't wanna say they are parents' sailboat. This one right over here, it still says they are, they're, so we rule that one out. And this one right over here, they got rid of the apostrophe. There's no apostrophe right over here, but you need apostrophe, 'cause we're talking about whose sailboat is it? Well, it's the parents', it's the parents', their parents' sailboat, so it needs to be a possessive, parents', so you need the apostrophe right over there, so we rule that one out as well.