Learn Hardcore Finnish: Meidän pitää odottaa hetki.

It always appears in 3rd person singular, no matter who has to do the action.
The person is shown by the genitive pronoun, not by verb agreement.

Examples:

Minun pitää lähteä. – I have to leave.
Meidän pitää odottaa. – We have to wait.
Heidän pitää mennä kotiin. – They have to go home.

Notice that pitää stays the same, only minun / meidän / heidän changes.

Does pitää here mean “to like”? I’ve seen minä pidän kahvista.

Pitää has two common uses with quite different meanings:

To like (when followed by a noun in the elative case, usually -sta/-stä):
- Minä pidän kahvista. – I like coffee.
To have to / must (when followed by another verb in the infinitive, and the person is in genitive):
- Minun pitää lähteä. – I have to leave.
- Meidän pitää odottaa hetki. – We have to wait a moment.

So:

pidän + elative noun → like (e.g. pidän musiikista)
[genitive pronoun] + pitää + infinitive → have to / must (e.g. minun pitää opiskella)

Context and the form of the following word tell you which meaning is intended.

Can I say Meidän täytyy odottaa hetki instead? Is there a difference between pitää and täytyy?

Yes, Meidän täytyy odottaa hetki is also correct and very natural.

Both structures mean we have to / we must:

Meidän pitää odottaa hetki.
Meidän täytyy odottaa hetki.

Differences:

In everyday speech, pitää and täytyy are often interchangeable.
Some speakers feel täytyy can sound a bit stronger or more obligatory in some contexts, but the difference is subtle and often not important.
Regionally, some people prefer one over the other.

For learning purposes, you can treat them as synonyms and use either one.

Why is odottaa in the infinitive? Could I say Me odotamme hetken instead?

In the sentence Meidän pitää odottaa hetki, odottaa is in the basic infinitive form because it follows a “modal-like” verb (pitää, “have to”).

Pattern:

[genitive pronoun] + pitää/täytyy + infinitive

So:

Meidän pitää odottaa. – We have to wait.
Meidän pitää mennä. – We have to go.
Meidän pitää syödä. – We have to eat.

If you say:

Me odotamme hetken.

that is a different structure:

Me odotamme hetken. = We (will) wait for a while / for a moment. (a simple statement of what we do)
Meidän pitää odottaa hetki. = We have to wait a moment. (there is a necessity / obligation)

Both are grammatical, but they do not mean exactly the same thing.

Why is it hetki, not hetken or hetkeä after odottaa?

Normally, odottaa takes a partitive object:

odottaa bussia – to wait for the bus
odottaa ystävää – to wait for a friend

But time expressions often behave differently. Hetki here functions like a measure of time (similar to “an hour”, “five minutes”):

odottaa hetki – to wait a (short) moment
odottaa tunti – to wait an hour
odottaa viisi minuuttia – to wait five minutes

These are often in the nominative singular (or the basic number expression).

Could you use other forms?

odottaa hetken – also possible; can feel a bit more like “wait for a moment (period of time)”.
odottaa hetkeksi – to wait for (something) for a moment (with a sense of change of state; used in more specific contexts).

In everyday speech, odota hetki! / pitää odottaa hetki are extremely common and idiomatic.

Is there a difference between hetki and other ways of saying “a moment”, like vähän aikaa?

Yes, there are several common expressions:

hetki – literally a moment; short but somewhat neutral.
- Meidän pitää odottaa hetki. – We have to wait a moment.
pieni hetki – a little moment, often polite.
- Voitteko odottaa pienen hetken? – Could you wait a little moment?
vähän aikaa – a little while / some time, can sound slightly longer or vaguer.
- Meidän pitää odottaa vähän aikaa. – We have to wait for a little while.

All are natural. Hetki is very common and fits the short “just a moment” idea well.

Can I change the word order, like Hetki meidän pitää odottaa?

Yes, Finnish word order is quite flexible, but changes can affect emphasis.

Neutral, most typical:

Meidän pitää odottaa hetki.

Possible alternatives (with different focus):

Hetki meidän pitää odottaa.
Emphasis on hetki: roughly It’s a (short) moment that we have to wait. This might appear in contexts like correcting someone’s expectation:
Ei kauaa, hetki meidän pitää odottaa. – Not long, a moment we have to wait.
Meidän pitää hetki odottaa.
Also possible; emphasizes that the waiting period (a moment) is what matters.

For learners, stick with:

Meidän pitää odottaa hetki.

as the default neutral option.

How do I say “We had to wait a moment” or “We will have to wait a moment” using the same structure?

You keep the same basic pattern and change the tense of pitää.

Present (have to):

Meidän pitää odottaa hetki. – We have to wait a moment.

Past (had to):

Meidän piti odottaa hetki. – We had to wait a moment.

Perfect (have had to):

Meidän on pitänyt odottaa hetki. – We have had to wait a moment.

Future-like (will have to):
Finnish doesn’t have a separate future tense; you usually use the present with context:

Huomenna meidän pitää odottaa hetki. – Tomorrow we will have to wait a moment.

So you mainly change pitää → piti / on pitänyt, and use time expressions for future.

How do I say “We don’t have to wait a moment” or “We don’t have to wait” using this pattern?

To make pitää negative in the “have to” meaning, you use the negative verb (ei) and change pitää into a special necessive form tarvitse or (more formally) pitää with ei + infinitive; but in practice, Finns usually avoid negating pitää and instead use ei tarvitse.

Most natural negative of “have to”:

Meidän ei tarvitse odottaa. – We don’t have to wait.
Meidän ei tarvitse odottaa hetkeä / hetkiäkään. – We don’t have to wait even a moment.

If you try to negate pitää directly:

Meidän ei pidä odottaa.

this usually means something closer to “We must not wait” / “We should not wait”, i.e. a prohibition or strong advice, not “we don’t have to”. So for “don’t have to”, use ei tarvitse.