Hmmm.... that really is a difficult decision. Especially being how special Finn is to you.

My friend has a Border Collie puppy. She lives with her brother and her Mom, and I live about 5 minutes away. Sadie was crated when she needed to be, but we worked out our schedules every day so that she wasn't in it for more than 3 hours at a time, and she had a good 1-2 hours of running and playing in between crate time.

To me, honestly, a BC puppy is not going to be physically and mentally exercised properly with that kind of schedule. I would recommend that the family adopts a BC that is a mature adult. There were a few days when Sadie was in her crate for longer periods, and my friend called me unexpectedly to visit and let her out. She was obviously VERY tired of being in that crate, when I got there. With a breed like this, 8 hours of solid crating EVERY day, with only a half an hour break... it's just not the ideal situation, in my opinion.

If these people were very experienced with the breed, or if Finn would be getting a solid 1-2 hours of play and free time in between crating, or if they were going to actively involve him in dog sports/training, it might be different... but if they're the "average" home, I would not adopt him out to that situation. Plus, with a LOT of people, they will make a situation sound much better than it actually is. Like you said, who knows of the teenager will actually be coming home every single day and who knows if he'll do anything more than take Finn out to eliminate and put him right back in? Unless they will be incredibly commited to dedicating basically ALL of their time at home, before and after work/school, to playing with Finn, socializing Finn, and training Finn, I can see such a situation being detrimental to the development of a puppy of such an intelligent and active breed. Isn't Finn a bit undersocialized, too? I would be very picky in his case especially, to find a home that knows what they're doing and has time to work with him in this important stage of his puppyhood.

When I adopted Fozzie, it was stated on his Petfinder page that some one had to be home most or part of the day. Luckily, there is basically always some one home with the dogs here. I don't think it's incredibly picky to ask that at least part of a full work day is spent at home with a young puppy... particularly in breeds that do need lots of physical and mental stimulation to be happy and well-adjusted.