How do you make your place feel like home? Renter says it can never feel like home

ruggedtoast

pinkteapot wrote: »

I thought there was something familiar...!

Same writer who wrote this load of tripe in 2010:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1332846/Take-girls-private-school-Id-starve.html

And it says in the above article that they sold the house just before the market crashed, so they got out at peak value.

Google 'shona sibary' if you feel like getting so wound up you'll punch your screen.

She has four kids, three of whom are at private school, and they pay £2000 in rent, and they mortgaged their house for £500,000 and still got out without losing money, and she is whining in the Daily Mail, and the Daily Mail is paying her; and I just cliked on the link thereby helping both her and the Daily Mail to make money.

:wall:

BitterAndTwisted

It's an article in the Daily Mail: ipso facto I rest my case.

Nothing this woman has to say is based on any reality that I'm familiar with. Sold their house after using it like an ATM, while they spent a mint on school-fees they patently couldn't afford? No sympathy here. It could be a common story just on a different scale. I have more sympathy for those who can't afford their modest mortgages after suffering joblessness while they fail to provide their kids with the basics. The basics in my world do not include private schools.

All this reminds me of a former employer and her tales of (extremely well-heeled) woe who tried to get me to accept a pay-cut after the crash in 1980-whenever-it-was when I was told that they'd lost a bundle on the exchange-rates when transferring some their funds from Switzerland. Short-shrift doesn't go anywhere to explain my reaction. People with a very refined sense of victim-hood rarely appreciate others laughing in their faces. I asked for a raise.

mylastpound

Good Question ....ive also been thinking this...

i did rent a flat for 1 year and ive now owned my house for 6 years - ( mortgaged but currently in neg equity by £3k)

i dont feel like this is my home, to me this feels like a stop gap / someone elses house and i cant seem to make me think any different

ok i bought this house when i was young and single. its on the edge of a council estate and you do get kids that have no respect and it has got worse over the last 5 years

ive got to the stage were i resent this house and i cant understand why my parents didnt say , dont buy it

if i could start again i would save alot more and i buy in a different part of town that has more going for it - but hey i dont have a crystal ball - plus now ive been with my partner 5 years and your life does change in 6 years

even if i did the odd jobs like new fence outside ( to stop kids walking over my front lawn)
have a new conservitory to gain an extra room
new kitchen and bathroom

i still dont think id be happy :mad:

i should be greatfull that i bought a bit before the boom and that i was in a position where i could by a 3 bed semi with south facing back garden, with a big back garden in a quiet cul de sac ( apart from the council estate over the other side)

currently im paying CC debt off and then i will do some over payments - and maybe eaither rent this out or sell and buy elsewhere :eek: but il cross that bridge when i get there

but i do understand when people say ......it doesnt feel like home

rant over

debrag

Our landlord allows us to be shelves up, pictures on the walls etc.

mynameisclare

breadlinebetty wrote: »

Cats do make a place feel homely but some landlords forbid tenants having pets.:(

These people seem to have come to the compromise of giving their children cats' names.

nearlyrich

Well I just read the second article and she has sunk even lower in my estimation now LOL. My children were educated at state schools they both have manners and both have great jobs, her priorities are all wrong, she wants the kudos of mixing with the rich and famous but she is not earning enough to cover the bills. I might not be private school educated or famous but I can afford to run my life and I don't have to rely on embarrassing my family with poor me articles in the Daily Fail to bring home the bacon. If you are reading this Shona I suggest you get on Old Style, DFW and get down to Aldi ASAP.

Callie22

As a tenant, I struggle to make rentals, especially our current place, feel like home. To me, a home is somewhere that is secure, and somewhere where I can have control over who comes in and when. It's hard to feel like that when your landlord and letting agent don't really believe in respecting your privacy.

The lack of control is frustrating in other ways - like when you have to live with disrepair for weeks and weeks because the landlord won't give permission for repairs, or when you have to live with other people's choices in terms of decor. In one house we lived in, the kitchen worktops needed replacing and rather than matching what was already there (a nice, fairly expensive beigy colour), the landlord replaced them with the cheapest of the cheap matt black stuff, which irritated me every time I looked at it. It's also frustrating not to be able to do the little things that make you more comfortable - like putting a coat rack up, or a nail in the kitchen to hang a clock or a calendar, or insulating the loft ...

A 'home' is somewhere where you can control your surroundings - put a shelf up, paint a wall etc. Again, I think I've been unlucky but most of my landlords have been the 'just waiting till the market gets better' types who want the house looking like a hymn to magnolia so that it's 'sellable'. From a practical point of view, I'm also not really willing to spend money on someone elses' house if I'm only living there on a six month contract, and again I've struggled to find anywhere that offers more than that. It's the little things like wanting to grow some veggies, that kind of thing - it's hard to get motivated to plant them when you don't know if you're going to be there to see them grow, or if you'll be able to move somewhere that'll take pots and planters.

I'm not shallow, but it is hard to make somewhere a 'home' when you have little control or security.

compwins

I think hanging photos so walls are not so baren really makes a rental feel homey to me

Owain_Moneysaver

breadlinebetty wrote: »

Cats do make a place feel homely but some landlords forbid tenants having pets.:(

Even dead ones?

rentergirl

Humphrey10 wrote: »

By owning it. Otherwise it's not mine, is it? It's the landlord's.

And we are reminded of this fact every day, buy rules on what we can do with the flat we pay to live in.