Aunti Laura's Profile

We just did this at our rental. we used small PVC pipe to anchor both ends of solar fabri we bought cheaply onling and used a non-office supply stapler to attach it to the overhang. we did a pvc frame and zip tied it to the railing on the balcony, so as not to injure the rental property. (we fudged that by having about 18 staple holes under the overhang.
Made a measured 8 degree F difference in the room next to the window we shaded
I have pictures. I could take some nicer ones and sent them to you. Womyn2me at aol dot com

I have always rented. (I'm 50) so I have a liberal approach to the idea of recreating a rental space into my own.

The first concept is that I consider my damage deposit to be the price I pay to individualize my space. I paint the walls and hang things up and I am frankly not going to take the time to paint or spackly before moving. Most places I have lived in for around 5 years at a time, though, and the longest was 7 years.

As I said, I always paint and hang art and pictures and shelves. I always trade out the showerhead and I leave it when I go. We have usually had to change the two prong electrical outlets to three prongs as well since we like older places and those tend to be two prong.

Other than that, it really depends on the place. I usually do improvements in the yard, to include raised beds for gardens if there is no space or if the garden space significantly needs improvement. I do get permission to improve the outside, although it usually shocks my landlords how much money I put into the outside (I love to garden.)

the place we live now: we replaced the kitchen lights (open florescent bulbs with no covers are unacceptable to me) - We repainted the bathroom extensively (purple badly sponge painted walls - no way) and we have hung a nice coat rack in the living room that we will leave (due to the holes for the strong support we needed to make it stay)

We also traded out the cabinet and drawer pulls in the kitchen as well. and the landlord does a crappy job of ant extermination, so we hired someone to do that too.

We are planning on looking for a place in 2012 (our sister is moving in with us and we want a larger place with better appliances) so that will make 4 years in this house. We leave it significantly improved but are pretty sure we will not get the deposit back. ah well.