Breakdown of Osim stanarine, svaki mjesec plaćamo i pričuvu za zgradu.
Questions & Answers about Osim stanarine, svaki mjesec plaćamo i pričuvu za zgradu.
What does osim mean here?
Why is it stanarine, not stanarina?
Because stanarina is after osim, and osim usually requires the genitive.
The noun is:
- nominative: stanarina
- genitive: stanarine
So:
- osim stanarine = besides the rent
This is a very common pattern in Croatian:
- osim škole
- osim posla
- osim stanarine
Where is the word for we?
It is built into the verb plaćamo.
Croatian usually does not need a separate subject pronoun if the verb ending already shows who is doing the action.
- plaćam = I pay
- plaćaš = you pay
- plaća = he/she/it pays
- plaćamo = we pay
- plaćate = you pay
- plaćaju = they pay
So plaćamo already means we pay.
You could say mi plaćamo, but mi would usually add emphasis or contrast:
- Mi plaćamo, a oni ne. = We pay, but they don’t.
What form is plaćamo exactly?
Plaćamo is the 1st person plural present tense form of the imperfective verb plaćati.
So it means:
- we pay
- we are paying
- in this context, more naturally: we pay regularly / habitually
Because the sentence says svaki mjesec (every month), Croatian uses the imperfective verb very naturally here for a repeated action.
Compare:
- plaćati = to pay, to be paying, to pay regularly
- platiti = to pay completely, to make a completed payment
Here plaćamo is better because the sentence describes a recurring monthly obligation.
Why is i before pričuvu?
In this sentence, i means also or too.
Croatian often puts i directly before the word or phrase it is adding.
So:
- plaćamo i pričuvu = we also pay the reserve fee
The idea is:
- besides the rent,
- we also pay pričuva
This is different from English, where too often comes at the end:
- We pay a reserve fee too.
In Croatian, i usually comes earlier, before the added element.
What exactly is pričuva?
Pričuva is a housing/building-management term.
In everyday Croatian, it usually means a reserve fund contribution or building maintenance reserve for an apartment building. It is money paid regularly for shared building costs, maintenance, repairs, and similar expenses.
Grammatically, here it appears as pričuvu because it is the direct object of plaćamo:
- nominative: pričuva
- accusative: pričuvu
So:
- plaćamo pričuvu = we pay the reserve fund contribution
Why is it za zgradu? What case is zgradu?
Zgradu is in the accusative singular.
The noun is:
- nominative: zgrada = building
- accusative: zgradu
That is because the preposition za here takes the accusative:
- za zgradu = for the building
So this phrase explains what the reserve fund is for:
- pričuvu za zgradu = reserve money / reserve fee for the building
Why does the sentence say svaki mjesec? Could I also say svakog mjeseca?
Yes, you can also say svakog mjeseca.
Both:
- svaki mjesec
- svakog mjeseca
can mean every month.
In this sentence, svaki mjesec is a very natural time expression and is common in everyday language.
Very roughly:
- svaki mjesec = every month
- svakog mjeseca = every month
In many situations, the difference is small or nonexistent for practical purposes.
Why is there no word for the, as in the building?
Because Croatian has no articles.
There is no separate word for:
- a
- an
- the
So zgrada or zgradu can mean:
- a building
- the building
The exact meaning comes from context. In this sentence, English naturally uses the building, but Croatian does not need a word for that.
Can the word order be changed?
Yes. Croatian word order is fairly flexible because case endings show the grammatical roles.
The original sentence is natural and clear:
- Osim stanarine, svaki mjesec plaćamo i pričuvu za zgradu.
But other orders are possible, depending on emphasis, for example:
- Svaki mjesec, osim stanarine, plaćamo i pričuvu za zgradu.
- I pričuvu za zgradu plaćamo svaki mjesec, osim stanarine.
This is possible, but much more marked and less neutral.
One important detail: moving i can change what is being emphasized as also.
Is stanarina the usual word for rent?
Yes, stanarina is a common everyday word for rent, especially for an apartment or place to live.
Another word you may also see is najamnina, which is more general and can sound a bit more formal or legal depending on context.
So in everyday speech:
- stanarina is very natural here
In this sentence:
- Osim stanarine... = Besides the rent...
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