Renter-friendly upgrades you can undo when you move
Peel-and-stick tile, plug-in lights and new hardware: changes our hosts made to rentals that come back off when they leave.
A renter-friendly upgrade is a change you can reverse before you hand back the keys. Many of the renters we've toured made their places feel like home this way. They used peel-and-stick tile, contact paper, plug-in lights and a lot of paint. Here's what they did, what it cost when they told us, and what to check before you start.
How we chose these: every example below comes from a rental we've filmed, in the host's own words. Prices are what they told us on camera.
Start by asking, and keep the originals
The safest upgrade is one your landlord already agreed to. Jillian asked about removing a wall of shelves while touring her Upper East Side walk-up, then took them out on her first day. Sydney asked her landlord to move a big closet out of her bedroom and into the hallway. The landlord agreed, and her Toronto bedroom now fits a bed and a dresser.
Keep every fixture, knob and shelf you remove in a labelled bag. You'll need them on moving day. In Ontario, the government's standard lease says tenants must repair or pay for undue damage caused by the wilful or negligent conduct of the tenant, their guests or anyone else living in the unit (Ontario Standard Lease Guide). Rules differ by province and state, so read your own lease.
Cover floors and cabinets with peel-and-stick
Peel-and-stick tile and contact paper are the most common upgrades we see. They hide what you don't like and come off when you leave.
Gail laid checkered peel-and-stick tile over the plain floor of her Manhattan kitchen. The squares fit without cutting, though she had to lift the oven to slide it underneath. Camille covered a damaged fireplace surround and a broken ensuite floor in her Toronto rental.
Jillian went further. She laid black peel-and-stick over an old beige tile floor, covered stained cabinets in contact paper and added a peel-and-stick subway backsplash. In Toronto, Sofia wrapped grey kitchen cabinets in a burl-pattern film and used peel-and-stick tile across her condo, from the kitchen island to the bathroom floor.
Contact paper works on furniture too. Josh covered his Murphy bed unit in a wood-look paper to warm up his Brooklyn studio. Kim and Ryan wrapped a dark bathroom vanity in wood-look vinyl in their Brooklyn rental.
Add light without an electrician
Most rentals come with one harsh overhead light. Our hosts work around it.
- Swag pendants: Tanya stuck adhesive ceiling hooks in place, hung plug-in pendant cords from them and added IKEA shades in her Toronto studio. She calls it a cheap fix where there's no room for hard wiring.
- Plug-in pendants over the bed: Andy couldn't wire a ceiling fixture into his concrete ceiling, so he hung plug-in pendants on each side of the bed and hid the cords with white tape. See his Toronto one-bedroom.
- Rechargeable sconces: Jhenene stuck a rechargeable light to her bathroom wall with adhesive, with no drilling at all, in her Queens studio.
- Converted sconces: Madeline's mom had bought a pair of hard-wired sconces. Madeline added cords and plugs so they'd work on her wall in her Toronto apartment. She says a plug-in sconce is the easier choice for renters.
Swap the small things
Hardware, light shades and shower heads cost little and change how a room feels every day.
Gail traded chunky silver cabinet pulls for distressed brass and added lights under her cabinets. Andy swapped all the silver hardware in his apartment for black. Tanya's favourite change in her bathroom was a new shower head. Keep the originals for move-out day.
Paint, with permission
Paint is the biggest change for the least money, as long as your landlord agrees. Tanya painted her dark grey studio in Benjamin Moore's Chantilly Lace with one coat for about $110. Later she painted her bathroom walls and ceiling a deep maroon brown. That bathroom refresh, with a new shower head, came to a little over $200.
Kim and Ryan limewashed both bathrooms in their Brooklyn rental, ceilings included. They say limewash is forgiving: small mistakes add to the texture.
Wallpaper something small
You don't need to paper a whole room. Elise wallpapered her front door herself in her Toronto studio. It was a lot of work, she says, but she can take it with her. Tanya stuck a piece of wallpaper over an electrical panel she didn't want to look at.
Use curtains where you'd want a wall
Curtains divide a room without building anything. Jeff hung a curtain to hide the kitchen in his Long Island City studio. Sandrine ran floor-to-ceiling curtains on three walls of her Montreal living room for privacy from the bedroom next door.
Before you start
Read your lease, ask about anything bigger than a nail hole, and photograph the unit before you change it. Test adhesives on a hidden spot first. Then start with the change you'll notice every day, like the light over your bed or the floor you look at while you cook.