Ifrequently get confused when developers, landlords or agents marketing properties tell me a terrace property is a detached house or a detached house is a duplex or a two bed flat is a studio flat! Here are the correct descriptions of some of the different types of common building styles around the world! I hope this will be helpful
A Bungalow The word “bungalow” originates from the Indian word bangla, which in the 19th century referred to houses built in a Bengali style. Bungalows were created when British colonial administrators adapted the classic Indian style low roofs and porches built around them. They can either be detached or semi-detached. Places like Surulere and Yaba in Lagos State adopted the bungalow style of building between the 50s-70s
A Detached house is a single standing property that does not share any walls with any other structure. Due to the isolation of the property, they’re usually more “private” and generally more expensive than any other type of house
A Semi-detached house is a pair of houses joined together by a common wall. One side of each house shares a common wall, while the other side is detached
A Terrace house is a house that is situated in a long row of houses. They all usually look the same and identical structurally. Both sides of each house in the row share common walls with a neighbouring house, with the exception with the houses at each end of the terrace
An end of Terrace house is a house situated at the end of a terrace. Like a semi-detached house, only one side of the house shares a common wall, while the other is detached.
A Flat: is a living area that is self-contained within only part of a building. Usually, a flat is situated in a building that is split up into multiple living areas for different residents. In some countries, this means exactly the same as an “apartment”
An Apartment: a self-contained housing unit in a building which is often rented out to two or more people sharing a lease in a partnership, for their exclusive use. Sometimes called a flat. Some people have legal definitions of what constitutes an apartment. In some countries, “apartment” denotes a building that was built specifically for such units, whereas “flat” denotes a unit in a building that had been originally built as a single-family house, but later on subdivided into some multi-unit house type
Duplex house: commonly refers to two separate residences, attached side-by-side, but the term is sometimes used to mean stacked apartments on two different floors (Du-plex)The duplex house often looks like either two houses put together, or as a large single home, and both legally and structurally, literally shares a wall between halves. The duplex home can appear as a single townhouse section with two different entrances, though the occasional duplex with a shared common entrance and entry hall have been constructed.
A Bedsit A British expression (short for bed-sitting room) for a single-roomed dwelling which usually contains very sparse furniture and is very compact in design. Literally a bed and a place to sit
A Studio apartment or Studio flat (UK), or Bachelor apartment(US) Mini Flat(Nigeria) a suite with a single room that doubles as living/sitting room and bedroom, with a kitchenette and bath squeezed in off to one side. The unit is designed for a single occupant or possibly a couple.
A Townhouse In the UK, is a traditional term for an upper class house in London, and is now coming into use in Nigeria as a term for new terraced houses, which are often on three floors with a garage on the ground floor.
A Penthouse apartment is an apartment or condominium which is a single dwelling that is on one of the highest floors of an apartment building or condominium. Penthouses are typically differentiated from other apartments by extra luxury features.
Cottages are not common in Nigeria, but are houses that usually come with one and half storeys. The top floor is much smaller than the ground floor, as the pillars used to hold up the structure takes up a lot of the living space. The thick, dark, classic timber pillars are usually what characterises a cottage
Caroline A. Akinlotan
