Vocabulary and Collocations for Moving House

Vocabulary and Collocations for Moving House

Hello English learners. Welcome to a new lesson. Everybody moves house sometimes. There are all kinds of reasons to move house. You may have been accepted to a college or got a new job in another city or another country. You may need more space so you decide to move to a bigger flat or a house. Lots of people today are moving out of the cities. They decide to start a new life somewhere in the country and grow their own food. Whatever the reason, in today’s lesson, we will look at the vocabulary and collocations for moving house.

1. Rent a flat/house
2. Find a flatmate/housemate
3. Share a flat/house
4. Sign/break rental agreement
5. Give/receive a notice
6. Buy/acquire a property
7. Contact a real estate agent
8. Put down a deposit 
9. Put up a property for sale
10. Apply for a mortgage/home loan

Rent a flat/house

To rent a property such as a flat or a house, means to pay money to a landlord (the owner of the property) to live in it.

Find collocations and vocabulary for renting here

Vocabulary and Collocations Related to Renting

• We can’t afford to rent a beach holiday house but we can rent a studio.
• Sandra rented a cottage in the country which is a cheaper and far more pleasurable place to live than the city.
• The best time to rent a summer house is in January or February. 

Vocabulary and collocations for moving house

Find/get a flatmate/housemate

Quite often, students decide to find someone to live with so they can share expenses. 

• Brian found a flatmate last month so they are sharing the rent and the bills now.

Share a flat/house

We share a flat or a house with someone when we live with them in the same accommodation. 

• When my parents were students, they shared a big house with eight housemates.

Sign/break the rental agreement

A rental agreement is a legal document, usually written between the landlord (the owner of the property) and the tenant (a person who rents the property). Once you make an agreement in written form, you sign it. When you move out of the house or flat before the end of the agreement, or without giving notice, you break it.

• Will you sign the rental agreement here, please?
• Tenants shouldn’t break the rental agreement and move out of the flat without giving a notice.

Vocabulary and collocations for moving house

Give/receive a notice

A notice is a formal announcement of our intention to end an agreement. To give notice means to formally inform your landlord that you intend to move out of the flat/house. The landlord is the one who receives the notice.

• In case we want to move out of the house before the agreed period, we need to give a two-week notice to the landlady.
• Michael received the notice from his tenants. They are moving to Holland.

Buy/acquire a property

Property acquisition refers to getting ownership over real estate.

• When he got Cypriot citizenship, Ben bought a property on the island and moved in there. 
• Unable to settle in Oxford, the Joneses acquired a property in a village nearby.

Contact a real estate agent

A real estate agent is a person who sells and rents houses, flats and lands to his clients.

• Mary’s dad contacted a real estate agent to sell their house.

Put down a deposit

If you put down a deposit, you leave part of the money for the acquisition in a bank account to agree that you will buy it. 

• Sara’s got enough money to put down a deposit on her dream house.

Vocabulary and collocations for moving house

Put up a property for sale

If you put up a property for sale, you make it available for auction or sale.

• Have you heard that Mike’s house has been put up for sale? They’re moving to Australia.

Apply for a mortgage/home loan

A mortgage application is a legal document you submit to a lender (usually a bank) when you want to buy a property.

• When they got divorced, Tim applied for a mortgage loan with a local bank.

Click here to learn phrasal verbs for moving house

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