5 ways to make your rented property feel like home

“Why are Brits so obsessed with buying their own homes?” asked Agnès Poirier of the Guardian. There are many different reasons but the main one is that we don’t like the idea of working hard every month to pay off our landlord’s mortgage. However with house prices at near all-time highs and the need to raise £10,000s of savings as a deposit, the dream of having our own place is further away than ever before for most people under 40, it would seem.

However, renting does have its upsides. If you don’t like somewhere, you’re not tied to it. Yes, you do have to raise a deposit but nowhere near as much as you need to raise to buy a house. And sometimes, particularly if you’re younger, it’s nice to share all the bills with your friends and peers.

But even if your name is not on the title deeds, it’s important to make the place you live feel like home. Some of these improvements you can make can be financed with tenant loans (including tenant loans for bad credit applicants). What are Loan Princess’s top 5 tips for making your rented property feel like home? Well, we polled our team and this is what they suggested:

• spruce up your handles
• “lighten” up your home
• dress your windows
• soft furnishing secrets
• amazing floors

A quick word of suggestion first, though. Your rental contract will probably stipulate that you have to leave your property in the state that you found it in. However, given that more people are renting now than has been the case for decade, landlords can be pretty laid back and welcoming about any improvements you want to make to their property.

Always ask your landlord or your landlady about any improvements you want to make and go into detail about the changes you have in mind. Get an agreement you make about moving forward with decoration in writing. Bear in mind too that most landlords will, at some point, want to sell their properties so they are far more likely to agree to changes that are neutral and fresh-looking rather than highly-personalised redecoration that you might love but that may not be to everyone else’s tastes.

Spruce up your handles

Is the kitchen looking a bit tired? Why not replace the kitchen cabinet handles with something more decorative? Remember that most handles are manufactured to a common size so you can always take your new handles with you when you move – just remember to keep the old ones and affix them before moving day.

You can do the same with any bathroom cabinets, doors, and wardrobe doors.

“Lighten” up your home

Most rental properties have unremarkable light fittings designed to serve a purpose rather than to add vibrancy and a flourish to a property.

You could choose to replace your lampshades with something far more decorative and personal which add ambience and scale to a room. Make sure that you carefully store the light fixtures and fittings so that you can re-install them when you’re moving out because, as with the handles in your kitchen and bathroom, you’ll be able to take the lighting fixtures and fittings you’ve bought with you.

There’s a great piece lighting here including information on lamps, lanterns, statement pendant lights, and candles on HouseToHome.

Dress your windows

Another potential decorative feature overlooked by landlords in the interest of reducing their own costs as much as possible are curtains and blinds. They do their job – they block out light and they provide you with privacy – but they don’t do much else.

You could think about adding colourful curtains of your own and window dressings to personalise each room. They are reusable too although you will have to make sure that, when you move to your next rental property, the windows are a similar size. If they are, you can bring the personalisation and the flair from your current property straight to your new one.

Soft furnishing secrets

It’s amazing the difference that a throw on the sofa and new cushions make to even the most unremarkable sofa and chairs. It’s the same with a colourful duvet in the bedroom too. With bright, colourful soft furnishing accessories, you don’t need brand new furniture or to get the paint brush out to breathe new life into a space.

Amazing floors

You may be lucky to be renting a property with absolutely amazing-looking wooden flooring. But the chances are that you’re actually spending money every month on a property with either the thinnest and scruffiest carpet known to mankind or untreated wooden flooring that’s seen better days.

Think about a big attractive rug for the areas of flooring that you’re not so keen on. Not only will they give the property your own stamp but they will protect the flooring underneath from wear, tear, damage, and stains so that’s one less thing you have to worry about when you ask for your deposit back at the end of your tenancy.

Tenant loans for bad credit applicants with Loan Princess

Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a homeowner to get a loan to spruce up your property. If you’re a tenant and you want to borrow money to really make your rented property your own, speak to Loan Princess about tenant loans. And yes, we can help you tenant loans for bad credit applicants too.

How does it work? Well, first of all, Loan Princess doesn’t lend you the money – and that’s a good thing. The reason it’s a good thing is because we can take a step back on your behalf, survey the market, choose which lenders to approach, and then present your application to them.

There are a few dozen tenant loan companies in the UK, slightly less offering tenant loans for bad credit applicants. We know the type of borrower each lender likes to work with so once we have your application, we can use the details you provide us with together with the details from your credit report so that we only propose you to the lenders you have a real chance of getting a “yes” from.

The whole process happens in a few seconds. Once we’ve got lenders’ offers back, we’ll then show you the one that offers the cheapest interest rate. We’ll explain in full detail the charges and how much you’ll be repaying and when.

It’s then up to you to tell us whether you’re happy with what we’ve found. If you are, simply sign the online application form and you and your lenders will enter into an agreement. If you don’t like the offer, simply turn it down. We never charge you for our service – we only get paid by the lender when a borrower takes out a loan.

Our service is free and there’s no obligation on you – Please Click Here to start your application.