Specialised prison almost put by empty house (5)
I believe the answer is:
niche
'specialised' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'prison almost put by empty house' is the wordplay.
'prison' becomes 'nick' (slang term for prison).
'almost' means to remove the last letter (most of the word but not all of it).
'put by' says to put letters next to each other.
'empty house' becomes 'he' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'nick' with its last letter taken off is 'nic'.
'nic'+'he'='NICHE'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for niche that I've seen before include "Specialized market" , "Recess; comfy corner" , "Select place in market" , "Well-suited position" , "Small recess or cranny" .)