Apartment

An apartment normally forms part of a bigger building, or occupies a portion of a building as an area for accomodation or housing. Apartments can be purchased and occupied by the owner, or can be rented out to tenants, by the owner.

An apartment is also known as a flat, although in the East, particularly in Malaysia a flat refers to a lower income housing project, built for and occupied by lower income earners. The term apartment is more regularly used in Northern America, and the term flat is widely preferred or used in the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth countries. An alternative name used for apartment is that of condominium, which is used to describe a more luxurious and upmarket apartment.

Ownership of an apartment or apartments can be structured in various ways. The dweller of an apartment can be a shareholder in a coporation that owns the entire development, in which instance that share that is owned will be relative to the size of their apartment. Alternatively an owner may own their dwelling outright and all residents in the development or block of apartments co-own the public spaces and contribute towards the upkeep of the mentioned area.

The term unit has been used to describe apartments, flats or condominiums, as well as commercial developments; this is however used for descriptive analysis of the overall building or complex, containing the amount of units.