Estructura USED TO: Hablar de rutinas en el pasado

Positive Form

Subject + [USED TO + Infinitive] + Complement

-          My wife USED TO PLAY volleyball.

Negative Form

Subject + [didn’t USE TO + Infinitive] + Complement

-          Peter didn’t use to drink whiskey.

Question Form

Question Word + [did + Subject + USE TO + Infinitive] + Complement

-          What sport did Maria use to practice?

-          How much money did you use to spend at the casino?

-          Did Juan use to play the violin?

USE:

We use the structure USED TO to talk about PAST HABITS and ROUTINES.

Please remember that when we talk about present habits and routines we use the PRESENT SIMPLE. There is no present form of the structure USED TO. Look at the following table

Table 2

Present habits and routines	Past habits and routines
I get up at 6:00 am	I used to get up at 6:00 am
Santiago smokes	Santiago used to smoke
My mother cooks	My mother used to cook
They don’t play tennis	They didn’t use to play tennis
Juan doesn’t teach	Juan didn’t use to teach
Does Tina work for IBM?	Did Tina use to work for IBM?
Where do they live?	Where did they use to live?

If we have the following sentence

Brian used to work at the bank.

The present form of the sentence is:

Brian works at the bank CORRECT

Brian use to work at the bank INCORRECT