"Would have had to have been" vs "would have had to be" for past event conditions


I instinctively said



I would have had to have been over 180 lbs for that to have happened.



I thought that seemed overly wordy. Too many "have"s and "had"s. So I tried:



I would have had to be over 180 lbs for that to happen.



That didn't feel right, though.


My brother and I were talking of a past event. He suggested something that could have happened. (Something like, You could have hung from the chandelier to get it out). I tried the first of the above statements. I want to speak about something that would need to occur for something else to occur in that past situation.


What would be the proper way of saying what I was trying to say up there‽



Answer



I would have had to have been and I would have had to be are alternatives, but have had already sets up the time reference, so the infinitive to be, rather than the perfect infinitive to have been is enough. Usage seems to confirm this. The British National Corpus has 15 records of would have had to have been and 45 of would have had to be. The figures for the Corpus of Contemporary American English are 38 and 67.


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