How to Use ramshackle in a Sentence

ramshackle

adjective
  • The movie's ramshackle plot is confusing and not believable.
  • Their house sits among a cluster of ramshackle buildings at the end of a dirt track.
    — Dennis Normile, Science | AAAS, 21 Sep. 2017
  • The road is lined with endless rows of ramshackle redbrick buildings.
    — The Economist, 14 June 2018
  • The sound is loose, rootsy, ramshackle rock with elements of swing and gospel.
    — Spin Staff, SPIN, 22 Apr. 2022
  • There are ramshackle front porches and naked light fixtures and no-frills curtains.
    — Michael Cavna, Washington Post, 4 Nov. 2022
  • In this sleepy fishing village, there are ramshackle stands on most street corners.
    — Kurt Soller, Bon Appetit, 1 June 2017
  • Massey’s has the alarming, ramshackle charm of a roadside stand that rents Uzis.
    — Rachel Monroe, The New Yorker, 23 Sep. 2023
  • Two sets of ropes hang flights below the aforementioned ramshackle stairs.
    — Claire Rafford, The Indianapolis Star, 13 June 2022
  • In their small, ramshackle yard, where his father kept ducks, there was an outside toilet.
    — Max Olesker, Longreads, 13 July 2023
  • Like many of the bars dotted across the region, Guiga’s is ramshackle and no-frills.
    — Andrew Downie, Time, 3 Dec. 2022
  • Gone were the ramshackle shanties overflowing into those same streets.
    — Elliot Ackerman, Wired, 23 Feb. 2021
  • Beyond the sign, a ramshackle encampment sprawled around two lakes.
    — Justin Jouvenal, chicagotribune.com, 2 Sep. 2017
  • Who slit the old man’s throat one night in the attic of his fabulously ramshackle abode?
    — Justin Chang, Los Angeles Times, 9 Sep. 2019
  • The ramshackle houses are heated with firewood and some still make do with an outdoor privy.
    — Alissa Simon, Variety, 12 Nov. 2021
  • Behind him stands a ramshackle house in the Nevada desert, casting him in a half light.
    — Rafael Francisco Salas, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 12 Feb. 2018
  • Many colonias, which feature a mix of ramshackle shacks and modest brick homes, are built in floodplains.
    — Scott Waldman, Scientific American, 23 Apr. 2018
  • The modern town is awash in commercial billboards and ramshackle malls.
    — Lawrence Osborne, Travel + Leisure, 16 Oct. 2021
  • Still, even if there were no rent freeze, Lee wouldn’t renovate his ramshackle apartment.
    — Naaman Zhou, New Yorker, 16 Oct. 2025
  • Have a quick peek at the dusty, ramshackle in-house museum—and then get yourself and your boots to the dancefloor.
    — Corey Seymour, Vogue, 21 Nov. 2019
  • The same could be said for In the Heights itself, which achieves a ramshackle beauty all its own.
    — Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 10 June 2021
  • This wasn’t just the door to a ramshackle one-room cabin with no electricity or plumbing.
    — Jewel, Vogue, 27 May 2021
  • Living in near-poverty in a series of poor apartments, or out of a ramshackle touring van for weeks on end?
    — Cat Woods, Los Angeles Times, 22 Jan. 2025
  • Glock says ramshackle homeless encampments are bad for the housed, but also bad for the unhoused.
    — Nick Watt, CNN, 9 Aug. 2022
  • Hines, 24, walked up to the ramshackle boardinghouse and gently knocked.
    — Washington Post, 27 Oct. 2020
  • The sisters fanned out around the ramshackle home, peering in windows and knocking on the siding to call her name.
    — Chris Kenning, The Courier-Journal, 24 Dec. 2019
  • The movie begins with Rob (Cage) living in a ramshackle cabin in the woods.
    — oregonlive, 15 July 2021
  • But Turner Mountain isn’t just some ramshackle ski area off in the boondocks.
    — Justin Franz, Washington Post, 30 Oct. 2019
  • Van Zant loathed flying, and the ramshackle plane contributed to his feeling of malaise.
    — Joseph Hudak, Rolling Stone, 5 Mar. 2023
  • The houses are ramshackle and the fencing around them made from old pallets, mattress springs, plywood.
    — Benjamin Preston, Fortune, 24 July 2017
  • The other, in a shack behind a ramshackle one-story countryside home, boasts more firearms than square feet.
    — BostonGlobe.com, 26 Sep. 2019

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'ramshackle.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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