un immeuble vs un bâtiment

Question

Actually the good old fashioned dictionary is quite specific about the use of these words, and 'un immeuble' is most definitely 'a block of flats' and funnily enough not 'a block of apartments', but there again, it is a proper English (English) - French dictionary. Block of apartments - how pan loafy is that (translation-upper crust)

Accepted Answer

Hi Anita, 
Dans mon immeuble is how you would describe the block of flats or the apartment block where you live in French.
If you live in a detached house, you would call this 'un pavillon'.
You can have, des immeubles de bureaux for office blocks .
The word 'bâtiment' indicates just any old building. 
Un immeuble is a bâtiment but a bâtiment is not necessarily an immeuble it can be a school, a library ...
It's interesting to see how the two words are used, if you want to say that your husband is a builder, you would probably say 
Mon mari travaille dans le bâtiment 
But if you said -
Mon mari travaille dans l'immeuble
You would mean that he is working in the block of flats you are mentioning.
Very interesting differences!