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Synonyms

flophouse

American  
[flop-hous] / ˈflɒpˌhaʊs /

noun

flophouses plural
  1. a cheap, run-down hotel or rooming house.


flophouse British  
/ ˈflɒpˌhaʊs /

noun

  1. Also called (in Britain and certain other countries): dosshouseslang a cheap lodging house, esp one used by tramps

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

Etymology

Origin of flophouse

First recorded in 1890–95; flop + house

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.

See Examples For:

He hopped from one flophouse to the next, sending what little money he could earn from construction jobs back to his wife and children.

From Los Angeles Times Apr. 11, 2023

Part of the scheme involved an alleged plan to remove permit violations in the flophouse owned by Mr. Pelosi.

From Washington Times Feb. 1, 2022

Sure, your mom might think your bedroom looks like a flophouse, but how many people are in your bedroom regularly?

From Slate Mar. 10, 2020

“He was a young father, he had a flophouse, he had the secondary life where he kept other things away from people… Everything came together as a bit of a perfect storm for him.”

From Fox News Jan. 25, 2020

Re-creations of the Addams Family house, the abandoned shack in the Evil Dead trilogy, Tyler Durden’s flophouse in Fight Club, and the Lars Homestead on Tattooine.

From "Ready Player One: A Novel" by Ernest Cline

The film captured the city’s most explosive bands tearing up their stages and flophouses, making Spheeris the poet laureate of disenchanted young Los Angeles.

From Los Angeles Times Oct. 13, 2023

Towles revels in boxcars, flophouses and seedy bars, the junkyards of failed dreams.

From Washington Post Oct. 4, 2021

Men have historically found refuge in cheap motels and flophouses along the Bowery, which has long welcomed the downtrodden with nowhere else to turn.

From New York Times Oct. 6, 2019

CBGB’s, at 315 Bowery, has become a legend, but in those days it was a dive bar on the ground floor of one of the many flophouses that lined the avenue.

From Fox News Sep. 30, 2019

Only after he was starving and sleeping in flophouses did he tell them, “I’ve got no money and noplace to go,” and they were angry with him.

From "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother" by James McBride

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