An apartment is a self-contained home, with its own kitchen, bathroom and entry door, inside a building that holds several homes. In the United States the word usually also says something about ownership: one owner holds the whole building and rents every unit out, either directly or through a property manager.
Apartments are the most common form of rental housing in many cities, ranging from a few units above a shop to towers with hundreds of homes.
Common types of apartment buildings
- Walk-up. A low building, often two to five stories, with stairs but no elevator.
- Garden style. Two or three story buildings spread across a landscaped site, often in suburbs, with parking nearby.
- Mid-rise. Roughly five to twelve stories with elevators, common in growing urban neighborhoods.
- High-rise. Taller towers with elevators, a staffed lobby and shared amenities.
- Small multifamily. A duplex, triplex or fourplex, where units are often called apartments even though the building looks like a house.
Within a building, units are usually described by layout: a studio has one main room, while one, two and three bedroom apartments add separate bedrooms.
How renting an apartment works
A tenant applies, passes screening, signs a lease agreement and pays a security deposit. Rent covers the use of the unit and, in most buildings, the upkeep of shared spaces such as hallways, laundry rooms, parking and grounds. Utilities may be included in rent, billed back or paid directly by the tenant, depending on the building.
Because one owner controls the whole property, rules are usually consistent from unit to unit. Repairs, trash collection and common area upkeep are the owner’s job, which is one reason many renters prefer an apartment to a privately rented condo.
Example
A hypothetical 24 unit garden style property has 12 one bedroom units at $1,400 and 12 two bedroom units at $1,750. Scheduled rent is $37,800 a month. The owner pays for landscaping, a shared laundry room, pest control and a part time maintenance technician out of that income, and tracks every unit on a single rent roll.
Why it matters for landlords
Apartment buildings concentrate many leases, payments and repair requests in one place, so small inefficiencies add up quickly. A missed renewal or a slow turnover across 24 units costs far more than in a single home. Owners and managers often rely on software to keep leases, rent and work orders together. TenantLoop’s multifamily tools cover online rent collection, a rent roll from the ledger, building wide announcements and work orders from the tenant portal.
Related terms
Related questions.
What is the difference between an apartment and a unit?
Unit is the general word for any separate rentable space, including a room, a condo or a storefront. An apartment is a residential unit inside a building with several homes.
Can an apartment be owned instead of rented?
When individual units in a building are sold to separate owners, they are usually called condominiums or co-ops. The word apartment normally means the whole building has one owner and every unit is rented.
Who maintains the shared areas in an apartment building?
The owner or the property manager, paid for out of rent. Tenants are usually responsible only for keeping their own unit clean and reporting problems.