Unit (housing)

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In common speech in Australia and New Zealand, the word unit, when referring to housing, usually means either: an apartment, (where a group of apartments is contained in one or more multi-storied buildings (an 'apartment block'));or a villa unit or home unit, where a group of dwellings is in one or more single storey buildings, usually arranged around a driveway. In this usage, a unit is a self-contained suite of rooms, usually of modest scale, which may be attached, semi-detached or detached, within a group of similar dwellings. Used in the Australian and New Zealand urban planning and development industry, unit is also a synonym for dwelling, as in, "This development has 22 units per hectare".
A single room unit is more commonly referred to as a studio flat or bedsitter, otherwise known as a Single Room Occupancy or SRO in North America.

It can be hard to discern precisely what attributes distinguish some multi-dwelling developments as units from those referred to as flats or apartments, though everyday usage suggests there is a class dimension to the term.