rent

Universal Words noun, verb-see also RENDv. noun 1 [U,C] an amount of money that you regularly pay so that you can use a house, etc: How much rent do you pay for this place? * The landlord has put the rent up again. * a month's rent in advance * a high / low / fair rent * (BrE) a rent book (= used to record payments of rent) compareHIREn. 2 [U,C] (especially AmE) = RENTAL(1) 3 [C] a torn place in a piece of material or clothing IDIOMS for rent (especially AmE) (especially on printed signs) available to rent verb 1 ~ sth (from sb) to regularly pay money to sb so that you can use sth that they own, such as a house, some land, a machine, etc: [VN] to live in rented accommodation / housing / property * Who do you rent the land from? * In the long run, it works out more expensive to rent a television than to buy one. [also V] 2 ~ sth (out) (to sb) to allow sb to use sth that you own such as a house or some land in exchange for regular payments: [VN] He rents rooms in his house to students. * The land is rented out to other farmers. * She agreed to rent the room to me. * [VNN] She agreed to rent me the room. 3 [VN] (especially AmE) to pay money to sb so that you can use sth for a short period of time: We rented a car for the week and explored the area. * Shall we rent a movie this evening? * We rented a villa in Spain last summer. compareHIREv.(1) 4 [V] (AmE) to be available for sb to use if they pay a particular amount of money: The apartment rents for $500 a month. ______________________________ BRITISH/AMERICAN rent / hire / let Verbs You can hire something for a short period of time (BrE only), but rent something for a longer period: We can hire bikes for a day to explore the town. * We don't own our TV, we rent it. In AmE, rent is always used. It is sometimes now used in BrE instead of hire, too. The owners of property can hire it out for a short period (BrE): Do you hire out bikes? Or they can rent (out) / let (out) a building, etc: We rent out rooms in our house to students. Outside a building you could see: To let (BrE) * For rent (especially AmE). To hire can also mean to employ somebody, especially in AmE: We hired a new secretary. see also LEASEv. Nouns The amount of money that you pay to rent something is rent or rental (more formal). When you hire something you pay a hire charge (BrE).On a sign outside a shop you might see: Bikes for hire (BrE). see also LET, LEASE, HIREn. ______________________________