ça fait vs. il est

I am still new to French, and I do not understand when you should use ça fait to say "it is" and when to use il est. Examples: il est ferme- it is closed combien ça fait?- how much is it? ça fait 60 euros- it is 60 euros I imagine that the answer is that ça fait does not mean "it is" as such, but that's the best English interpretation. Thank you for your help Jeff

I would use il/elle when referring to an object eg le magasin est fermé / la maison est jolie and ça when referring to a situation as in your example and ça me fait triste (it makes me sad), although there are of course exceptions; il fait beau, il fait du brouillard etc

Bonjour Jeff, I can understand your confusion. When learning expressions or phrases such as this, I would try to concentrate more on the context in which they are used as opposed to the literal translation. This is because much of French can not be literally translated without losing or changing the meaning. Literally, 'it is' is 'il/elle est'. However, when talking about the price of something we use the verb 'faire' (to make/to do) because prices that we pay are often accumulations of several items we purchase. It is similar to saying in English, "that makes how much?" I realise that this explanation may be a bit confusing but as I said before, it is better to learn the context as opposed to the translations. I hope this helps! - Marie-Claire