When you’re living in a rental, you may not always be able to change things.  While it can be frustrating to not have my particular aesthetic playing throughout my home, it forces me to be creative with what I can work with – the layout of our furniture, the colors that we bring with our decor, and other ways I try to make our home feel just like that – a home.

Over the last few months I’ve started to key into what I really love, things like open spaces and natural light, and things I may not love so much, specifically tile floor and dark walls.

Use the time that you’ve been given to learn what you like!

Things I never really thought of before living in a home: maintenance issues.  But since living  in our condo the last ten months, I’ve noticed those things alot more.

An oven burner here, a refrigerator leak there, and before you know it you’re spending several hundreds of dollars on repairs and/or replacements.

Thankfully though, most of our home maintenance repairs are taken care of under our rental agreement.  Not every landlord is like this, so it’s important to make sure you understand what they will and will not cover from the beginning.

If they do cover most of the items, that’s extra money that you get to save and put towards a down payment for a place of your own one day, when you probably won’t have someone to call on to take care of your repairs.

Does your landlord cover repairs?

One of the things I LOVE about renting is that we get to learn our new area without the commitment of buying weighing on us or the feeling of being stuck because of a mortgage. Renting has allowed us to saturate ourselves to see where our lifestyle really fits.

Do we want to be downtown or would we rather live in the “suburbs”? What stores are near us? Is it safe running in the area?

Even if you’ve lived somewhere all your life, I still think it’s important to evaluate when considering buying, and renting gives you the time you need to do so.

So get out, explore, and see where you like to be and what you like to do. Afterall, it might help you ignore the chipping paint in the bathroom:)