Podía ser - podría ser

[BobRitter]

Podía ser que lo encontrara. It might be possible to find it.
Podía ser que no tuviera tiempo. I might not have time.

Imperfect I used to be able, was able, could podía - Is this a past tense?
The sentences above from 123TeachMe are more in the future.

I am confused, again, as usual.

I'm guessing that "Podía ser" does not translate as expected.

Thanks you all again for your help. Bob

[AngelicaDeAlquezar]

This might be a regional or colloquial way to use the imperfect, but when making hypotheses in daily speech, one can often substitute the conditional (which would be the natural conjugation) for the imperfect tense.

In this case, it is used when the speaker is telling (now) about a possibility he/she had considered in a situation past.