disrepair
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of disrepair
Explanation
Disrepair is a state of being damaged or broken, especially because of neglect. Leaving your car in your parents' driveway all winter might result in disrepair. A house in disrepair needs help — it might look shabby, with flaking paint and a crumbling brick porch. This mostly happens when houses aren't being lived in, or when their owners don't have the money for upkeep. An entire city or neighborhood in disrepair feels neglected and even dangerous. The noun disrepair combines the prefix dis-, "do the opposite with repair, "mend or fix," from its Latin root reparare, "restore" or "put back in order."
Vocabulary lists containing disrepair
Donald Trump Inauguration Address- January 20, 2017
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Disrepair in NHS buildings led to thousands of potentially-harmful incidents last year including critically-ill patients being moved when rainfall came through the ceiling.
From BBC • Feb. 20, 2024
Disrepair and neglect have caused still more to close in just the last decade, making the newly-renovated Algin Sutton pool in South L.A. a rare, $17-million exception to the rule.
From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 14, 2021
Disrepair, dis-re-pār′, n. state of being out of repair.
From Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary (part 1 of 4: A-D) by Various
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
