Catherine from Minnesota's Profile

This looks exactly like how mine used to look! I painted the cabinet wall a nice deep red, and it really made the cabinets look new.

Coffee!

As an agent for property management: Having someone else move in that's not on the lease, is a violation of the legal document. We have had to file eviction on people that do the same thing you're suggesting. It's not just that it would leave you without a good reference -- eviction WILL follow you when we screen your application for a new apartment. That will remain on your record, and future landlords will see that no matter what.

It is further against the fair housing act -- a federal law, and subject to federal punishment -- for any landowner to deny housing based on familial status. So I don't see even a reason why you'd try to sneak in your boyfriend.

It's not like you're sneaking in a pet for the last month of your lease. Your boyfriend will be in the apartment as a resident -- if he breaks anything, if he skips out on his half of the rent -- right now that would be on you. Anything he does to that apartment is your responsibility. But if you are on the same lease, he is also legally bound to the terms of the lease.

This is similar to what we use at the animal shelter (I'm a volunteer).

Other things we've done:

- have the litter box sit on a little ledge, and use fitted sheets. The fitted sheets tuck over the ledge, and collect excess litter. The cats access the box from the sides/back of the table.

- someone built litter box cabinets for our cat colonies: what looks like a bench, with 2 little cat openings on either end. Then the top has brackets, so you can flip open the top, replace litter, and put the top back.

These were very helpful in the shelter, since it allowed the cats to be in a colony setting, but visitors weren't thrown off by the cat smell.

Hope that helps somebody!