Nobody Panic - How to Make Your Rental House a Home

Episode Date: November 19, 2019

Renting a crappy flat? Don’t think you’ll ever feel at home in said crappy flat? Stevie and Tessa look at ways you can cheaply make your rental a place that doesn’t make you want to burn it down. Because even if you’re only staying for a year, you deserve to spend that year without nude bulbs. Recorded and edited by Naomi Parnell for Plosive Productions.Photos by Marco Vittur, jingle by David Dobson.Follow Nobody Panic on Twitter @NobodyPanicPodSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/nobodypanic. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, I'm Carriad. I'm Sarah. And we are the Weirdo's Book Club podcast. We are doing a very special live show as part of the London Podcast Festival. The date is Thursday, 11th of September. The time is 7pm and our special guest is the brilliant Alan Davies. Tickets from kingsplace.com. Single ladies, it's coming to London.

True on Saturday, the 13th of September. At the London Podcast Festival. The rumours are true, Saturday the 13th of September. At King's Place. Oh, that sounds like a date to me, Harriet. Hello, welcome to Nobody Panic. Hello, come on in, pull up a seat or stay sat. Stay standing.

I'm Stevie. I'm Tassan. And we are, as ever, working at like how to help you be an adult without screaming all the time. This one is about how to make your rental house a home. Yes. I was very bad. I'm still renting. I'm very bad at that.

I've only got good at it this year when someone else did it for me. I didn't do it. So moved in with my boyfriend two years ago, The Shadow. Oh yeah. The shadow was very, very good at framing things. Oh. I was very ashamed of myself. I was just really like, yeah, I mean, if it wasn't for him,

I'd just be like, yeah, all the walls will probably still be bare. I'm very bad actually, like, doing it. I'd be like, yes, I have great plans to do this. And then I don't do it for about seven years. And then I move out, because obviously you move out every year when you're renting. Yes, it can be very, very tricky because you always feel like, well, this is just, this is just nothing. It's not really mine.

It's not mine, and I can't do anything. Especially if you don't like the landlord. You're like, me. horrible landlord that's their flat and then you hate them and then you don't want to do anything. Also, you are quite terrified to know what you can and can't change in case you lose your deposit. They're taking such an enormous deposit off you. The first rental property I had in London, it was just a very horribly decorated flat that clearly no one cared enough about.

And all of the furniture was from like, it looked like it was from the 20s, but not in like a cool vintage shop way in like a, well, if I sit on that, it will break, oh, it's broken sort of way. And when I opened all the cupboards to put my clothes in, there were like dead maggots in the cupboards. So I had to keep all my clothes in suitcases. And then the mattress looked like somebody had been killed on it. But I couldn't afford, because the mattress was one of those ones where the mattress was like part of the bed.

Oh, Christ. Yeah. And it also separated into four different pieces. What? What are you describing? I don't know, but that is what it was. So may I just pop in? I mean, please.

You two are currently living in a situation. where you're like, well, there's maggots. Maggots, we can absolutely put down to unacceptable living standards. 100% and you can definitely, even though you're like, well, I don't want to cause a fuss or I don't know what to, you know, you have to call your landlord and be like, cause the fast. Excuse me.

We did. And the landlord was the sort of person who I would wake up and he was sat on the end of my bed reading his mail. Okay. So he was a criminal. And then also we left because they said that they put up, they wanted to put the rent up. And on the same day, they also removed the back wall.

of the flat for building works and I woke up and there was no wall and it's an outside wall. So all of my stuff was just flying out of the bedroom. Oh my God. So what I'm trying to say is it's bad. Renting is bad in London. Well and everywhere at university maybe three weeks after we moved in we had a basement, we had this like cool basement in ours with a carpet and everything that we were like we're going to run like frat parties out of here. Oh my god yeah. We were very excited. I was never invited to the frat party. I tell you. why? Because two weeks into moving there, there was like torrential rain and the entire basement flooded, but like four foot of water. Like, it was flooded. And when someone came around, they were like,

well, you left this window open. And I was like, are you high? That's come directly up from underneath. Anyway, so they didn't do anything about it. And then the house behind us, directly attached to us, over the winter, they went away and their pipes all froze and exploded. And then, the ceiling caved in on their flat. So then we were then attached to a completely derelict house. And then because of the large water source available in our property and this very warm derelict house next door to us, it attracted basically a rat kingdom that the pest guy estimated was between six and seven.

And I was like, oh, okay, well, six and seven. A hundred breeding rats. Oh my God. So that's why you were never invited to our frat party in the basement. I didn't want to go if that's what it was. Oh, we're excited. Shit, that's terrible. Okay, well, what was your adult thing before we get into how to make your rental house a home

when you've got 700 rats in your basement? Anyway, my adult thing, I guess. I guess. Well, exciting me and Stevie have been to the affordable art fair. Hello. Hello. Not quite as affordable as I was hoping for. No, it turns out.

But in terms of art, it is affordable. I think what they've done is because they have these installment plans, so you can pay your extremely expensive art in installments, and that's the sort of... That's the affordable animal. Because it's between £50 and £6,000. But we did not find a lot of art that was £50. It was mainly the £6,000.

It was a lot of £6,000. And lots of very rich people being like, I'll buy that art. That's what I noticed anyway. I got a shuttle bus afterwards to the nearest tube station, Sloan Squire. Of course. And it was full of people, very rich people,

talking about the art they bought, and the driver was playing Craig David seven days. That's quite fun. But the point is, at the very end of the night, as they were like, ladies, please, you must leave. Me and my mum bought some art. And we were giddy, absolutely giddy with it. We shared the price of it.

It was 100 pounds. But I really like it. And every day I look at it and be like, what a cool piece of art. I've bought a piece of art. It's an ostrich reading the Wall Street Journal. Yes, I mean, you've done it down. You've done it down.

It's a little bit more cool than that sounds. But it is technically that's what it is, yes. What's yours? Mine is, right, okay. So, have you heard of fuel? Absolutely, yeah. Fuel, but with an age. Oh, yes.

And that's the crucial element. So Hewle is, it's an excellent idea. It's sustainable. We're not eating the right sort of, stuff. We're not getting our macro nutrients. I don't even know what that is and that's how bad I am at getting them. So I think it's excellent for people and it always surprises me whenever they talk that they're like, oh, food is just sort of fuel for me. I don't really, I don't really want to think about what I'm going to eat, you know? It's often if you just eat to live, you eat to live,

you eat to live, yes. Yes, I know, I remember being so unbelievably sad at a friend once saying that if you just took a pill every day that you had all your nutrients in it. You didn't have to eat. He would just do that. Yes, and this is what Hugh is for. And I was like, that's the saddest thing I've ever heard. So sad. But if you are like that, because lots of people are, and no shame here. Hew is cheap as well. So it works out at like two pounds a meal or something. And the reason I sound like an advert for Hewle right now is that I don't like it. So it wasn't for me. No, it was not for me. I've brought some Hewle with me today because I was like, perfect, drunk quite a lot of wine of the affordable art fair, came home, everything in my fridge to the extent when my boyfriend

was like, oh wow, are you really going back again? I was like, don't you shame me? And I nearly exploded with food. And then I woke up this morning. I was like, oh, I feel terrible. Oh, Hule. I've got that bottle of Huel. It's got good stuff in it. That might be a good thing to eat for lunch. Got in to do the recording. Walk past Jopolo was like, I'm so angry at them I don't have to eat this Hule bought a burrito. So this is the kind of level I'm struggling with. What will we say as the message of this piece, Steve? No, the message of the piece is as an adult, my adult thing is I've given Huell a good go. That's fantastic. And I'd like to tell people about it because if you are that sort of person, it's actually excellent for that sort of thing. I unfortunately have to eat a meal. So we're talking about rental

properties. So you've got your little place and you're sharing it with, I'd say, between five and 50 people. And you can't paint the walls. Sure, when the heating is on, when everyone can agree to turn the heating on, which is maybe one day a year, it feels like it could get warm at some point, but it's mostly cold. Also, I find in rental places, the bathroom is an absolute. shocker that as often. How can we make ourselves feel like you don't, I think it's very important that that mentality we were talking about earlier, you fight against that because I spent my entire 20s not fighting against that

and I think it definitely impacted every element of my life because once you have committed to being like, oh, I live in a shithole and I don't care, then you're essentially saying to yourself, you don't care about yourself and what you have, and by the same token, not that I, you know, could afford to buy really nice clothes, but like I wouldn't really care what I was wearing. Like, I wouldn't really, I didn't feel like I deserved nice things

because I didn't have enough of the money to then actually deserve them. But you deserve to be in a nice place now, regardless of your finances, regardless of, and of course it's very hard when you don't have any money, but you can totally do things to make your, even if it's just your bedroom, make your bedroom look nice. I mean, it's so important because it's sending a message to your brain and to your body and to everything that you are worth it. Yes, absolutely.

And I am completely guilty of this, doing this at the moment. I keep calling where I live a shit hole. And I keep saying, well, it's temporary. So I shan't even unpack. Yes. In fact, when you said, should we do a podcast recording in my flat, it's terrible, but, you know. And it's like, it's actually, the flat is not. No, and also at the full moon last week, I went to a full moon workshop, very on brand.

Did you? Yes. I'm not going to invite you to everything. You can't come to my frat party and you can't come to my full moon workshop. I'm going to do a ritual next week. Great. Good for you. I'd like it very much.

Yeah. I think I might start running. I might run one myself. Oh, great. Do that. If you want to come to my full moon workshop, everyone. 100%. Come along.

Something that you do at the full moon is that you sort of, you write a list of 10 things that you are grateful for. 10 things that you're going to be letting go that do not serve you. For me, it's always stop eating flour. God's sake. In things, just as to be very clear. Let that. Eating bags of flour.

Let it go. So it can be both like, I'm absolutely furious with Barbara, but it can also be like, stop eating those. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Let it go. There can be anything. You can be massive things that you're carrying around on tiny things.

And then your third column of ten things is your manifestation for the month. So like, I am going to X, Y, Z. Great. And it could be tiny things or biggest things. But what I was... And then you're supposed to burn it. But I actually think it's more interesting to hold onto them and, like, keep it somewhere that people don't.

don't read and then do it. Don't look at it, but like at the end of the year, look back and be like, oh yeah, and just see how far you've come. That's nice. But you're supposed to burn them. Blah, blah, blah. Anyway, I say this because at the top of my gratitude thing, I did, I have a house. It is safe and warm, and I have it and thank you.

Like, I'm very grateful for this thing. So I've been so down on it. And I was actually like, hey, it's a place. Great. It's mine and it's my house. And it is safe and warm. and I felt quite good about it, did all my other list. Then of course you should never look at anybody else's gratitude,

but the girl beside me had very big writing. And I'm a nosy bitch. And I looked over at hers and she had written, number one, I have a beautiful house that I love. And she'd underlined beautiful. Okay. And then I had to go to my letting go pile and write jealousy. Like, I will be letting that go.

Because I was so angry that she had a beautiful. beautiful house that she loved. You will. And mine was just safe and warm. You'll have a beautiful house. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Got to start some back. Anyway, but if I, and like, so Stevie brought me flowers recently, you know, to go in the house.

And like, if you make those little, just tiny changes that you're like, oh, this says, I love this place. And it therefore says, like, I am worthy of love and I am worthy of being a person. Otherwise, just wandering around every day being like, what bloody else. We'll be grumpy whenever you're walking around. And I've been in those flats, yeah, where you'd wake and be like, oh, my God. And then nothing really works. And there's a lot of things that are out of your control with the. with rental houses.

But there are some things that are in your control. And we are going to tell you all those things are. Here we go. Go. Do you want to go first? Certainly. My first one, it might be in your contract about painting the walls. If the walls are white, ignore that.

You can paint the walls. So just get another. If the walls already right, perfect. Paint them again. Because they will be covered in like dirt and damp marks. Yeah. So they made them nice white. Take them, like the transformation in making your walls bright white

when they used to be like a heinous dirt shade. that looked like a crime had happened will be enormous and it's something that of course you're not going to be in trouble for because you made it look better and you've not changed anything and you've not changed anything

and you can, I have in previous properties I made myself a signature wall which I've created it a beautiful colour of Costa Rican blue but if you can't do that you can get wallpaper from like a B&Q whatever you can use command hooks which are like basically

Velcro for your wall that you can I'm in a rental property at the moment and I can't nail or blue tack but everyone's up for command hooks because they're amazing. And you just put command hooks in the four corners of the wall. And then you can like wallpaper your thing.

And then when it comes time to take it down, just take it down. Great. Take it down. Perfect. You can also get lots of wallpaper for free. So you can, in B&Q, you can just be like, hmm, I'm considering this one.

Sample. And they will give you several metres worth of the thing. Excellent. And then you just go, keep going back until you've got a wall. Or you could all, like, conspiracies are like all of your housemates. You could take turns and going. So it's like a different person each time. Yeah, you did a great job with your,

with your last rental flag because you Tessa made like, I always talk about it, I always talk about it, essentially like an exposed wardrobe out of piping. Really great. Thank you so much. One of the biggest things is like nice storage.

Yeah. It's so, you know, you can get into rent out and there'll be like a tiny little rickety cupboard. It's like that's for all of your clothes. And obviously it doesn't fit. You're like, oh, I suppose it just like keep it all the suitcase like I did or just on the floor. But actually there's so many just simple,

storage things, just big boxes that stack, stackable boxes, or you don't have to buy a flat pack whole like chest of drawers. You can, there are so many ways. Yeah. So chances are in there, you'll probably have, either you've come unfurnished or they'll give you, or one bed, one huddleable thing of storage. And so all it will say in the inventory at the end is storage unit or chest of drawers.

So if that chest of drawers is different when you move out, like no harm, no foul, you know, so if you've got a crap one, put it on the store, street or put it on gum tree get yourself a better one is that true can you actually do that 100% oh i did not know that i thought it had to be the same one no and so especially if it's rubbish just like yeah just swap it get rid of it and swap it or if you want to like just say to the landlord i've replaced it with this much nicer one because so many people get them from ikea for what one year and then need to move on and then can't take it with them if you go on gum tree there is so many of the

chest of drawers and other thing no nude bulbs you get in there interrogation unit it's not yeah and you might be like, well, actually, I don't really mind. You will psychologically mind over the course of a year. H&M have a home thing and now Zara have a home section and Primark's home section is really good. So go to one of those things. They're not expensive at all and because obviously the temptation is due to Argos and get the one that everyone had. Don't do that because you'll just hate yourself. Just get like a nice one that's cheap from like H&M, Zara or Primark. And then you'll look like, you'll just feel like you're in a home and then also light would be so harsh and you're won't feel like quite often you know people are living in warehouse things it's like breeze blocks

and a nude ball be like now we're now we're talking prisons so you've got to home it up soften it and i would say with those things not there's many many things i'm completely saying always just get those second hand at a charity shop sometimes with those cotton lamp covers you want to maybe get one that's a bit newer just because they hold so much dust and also sadness and regret so oh god and they will it just will if you i've touched some in the past that literally disintegrated into my hands. Yeah, there's like, like, wasps from 1904 in there. So you know what, just like let that, you know, just get

a new one. Let those wasps go. In my old bathroom, he's like, look, and then just be like, obviously like bees from the early 20th century. They've got such stories to tell. And you're just staring at them every, you know, you don't really think like, every time I went for a wee, I'd just like look at some dead bees. Like, that's got to

build up somewhere. Like, that's not good for me. It's very close to the surface. It's very close the service. Well, now I've got quite quite a nice flap. But like, so Lambshades, those are the sort of things where like when you become, when you have to sort of, you've gone through your whole life just being like, well, there's the carpet, there's the lights. I don't, why would I be in charge of them? And then when you're in charge of them, you're like, have you seen how much it cost to buy a lamp? Oh my God, yeah. Suddenly you discover how expensive things are. But there will be aunties or grandmas or people in your life who are desperate to give you to help you out. To help you out. And, you know, the ones who say like, what do you want for Christmas? And they're desperate to give you homeware things. Oh, yeah, yeah. I never thought about asking for home off Christmas because I'm like, no. But it sounds so. boring because you want the new action man and a pair of hot wheels. Yeah, that's what you want

every Christmas. But then it gets to a point where you're like, it would be a good time to get some good house stuff and to get some good quality things. Nice towels or something. It's nice, but also, like, nice towels can be cheap. Like Wilkinson do loads of different towels. And again, I'm an ambassador for Wilkinson apparently. Because Wilkinson's got everything in it.

And then it's just so fun. Like, you can just go in there, you can get literally everything you need and it's not expensive. Because I'm just like it's so easy. I think it would be very easy to go like, make your house a rental as a home, just spend money on things. And actually, I would not have been able to have done that. And I also can't do that.

So I think those sorts of places, you could have just walk past it in the street being like, I'm going in there. What will have me from there? Get in there. A bucket? Because there's also so many buckets. So many buckets. But also, amid all the kind of like steel buckets. And the casserole. So many castles. Yeah. Yeah.

Amid that, there'll be so like a wicker basket. They'll be like, oh, I can use that as a laundry basket. And it actually, out of this sort of quite bizarre environment, it will look nice. Yes, yes, yes. Aladdin's cave of stuff that you do have to trawl through

but you're like, oh, here are some things. And it's these very tiny detailed things that will make all the difference in your home. I 100% know how stressful it is if you haven't got a design eye to look at a space and be like, how hard. But number one is the walls. Number two is the lighting.

Get rid of that naked bulb. And if you can, get a lamp in or a freestanding, make a different space so it does not feel like, you know. Yeah, there's really harsh lighting or darkness. It's horrible. It's the difference like when you, suddenly put a candle on, you're like, oh, gosh, I look, I look it's quisid.

Yeah. Oh my God. Oh my God, I'm beautiful. I'm beautiful. And then a harsh light. It's like the night, light coming on at the end of a club. Like, there is a reason we don't just go clubbing in a full, full light. You know, like light makes such an enormous difference. Transform a room.

If you have a living room, I read somewhere like six in ten rental flats just don't have a living room anymore. Because they use it as a bedroom. Is it a bedroom? It's so bad, isn't it? But if you have a living room or, you have a living room or, you? if you have like what I had in my weird rental flat, we had no living room, but we had like sofas in our bedrooms

and the sofas are like, don't sit on that. It just looks hideous. Tess has discovered sofa covers. Yes. Oh my lord. And they're quite cheap, aren't they? They're relatively cheap, yeah.

If you just Google sofa covers, you'll be amazed at a whole new world. You didn't even know was there. So great. They're sort of elasticated thing. You get them in all the different sorts of colors. Rental sofas are so disgusting. So disgusting.

Or they're like leather and like really uncomfortable. If you get like a cotton cover, then it just immediately feels like a bit cozier. If you have a sofa that you're like, I actually don't want to touch that. Then getting a, because just throwing a rug on it is not actually going to quite cut mustard. Because then the rug like falls off when you sit on it

and then you're like constantly, everyone's like constantly redoing the rug all the time or blanket. So these sofa covers go all the way over the sort of elasticated. You push them in in a quite very satisfying way. Can't recommend them enough. Didn't know they existed and low transformed. And then the stress that I have, I had when I moved into my flat last year,

was that I'm not very good. color coordinating things but found out basically if in doubt crisp white always always duvet pillows walls anything crisp white or when you are in a rental file it's just like everyone's stuff is all everywhere it just doesn't match anything stick to like pick three colors and you can go on like the color swatch wheel and check which colors work with which other colors pick three of them and just if in doubt buy and like tell all your housemaids you know like because people people will be buying cushions or for the for the sofa or someone's gone like I saw this rug and thought we could put it in the bathroom you're like it looks like someone's vomited on

it like what you everyone knows it's these three colours so then it will look a bit more classy and a bit more like you've had some thought gone into it when actually it's just the same three colours bit of a bit of a trick suddenly you look like bobby burke from queer eye Lawrence Leland Bowen oh of course our true hero the original guy thank you so much yeah if you do watch any of those interior design shows you realize like you don't have to knock the wall down and do something. You just be like, oh, and guaranteed all of those shows, they changed the wall color, and they got some new lighting, and they put the slightly nicer sofa in.

And then you're like, well, this is a whole new, this is a whole new house. Yeah. A very tiny one is wallpaper or wrapping paper and the liner of your drawers. Oh, yeah, good idea. So when you open them, instead of, you know, maggots, you're like, oh. Oh, a little pattern. Hello. A little pattern for a Sunday.

I had a one direction one in there for some time. That's a surprise. It certainly is. As I'm saying it, I'm even thinking, did I? What's that me? I did, I truly did. Wall stickers? You had a wall sticker?

Yeah? They're great. Because you can obviously get the ones that are like a very tacky. Then you can get like lovely ones as well. What's a wall sticker? You know, like a pattern that it looks like it was been painted on the wall or something or it's part of the kind of... And they just come off? They just, they just peel out.

Oh my God. Peer right out. There are so many of those that offer free samples of things. Lovely. Also, little things like, so if your bathroom's horrible, you probably will also have like you've bought, you know, a pack of nine loo rolls and you've just sort of put them in the bath

or like you don't have a bath, you've put them just sort of next. I bought or would always make a point of like going to like a challenge shop and buying like a 50p basket put the lorils in the basket. Suddenly it just looks like you've put some thought into it, you know? Yeah. There's little moments of care that you're like, oh.

Having a soap dish, or not having a soap dish, then the soap goes like disgusting all over the sink. That's actually really a little thing. got a little soap dish, and again, like, literally poundland do them. And all you needed, like, a little black soap dish or a little, like, marble soap dish. Obviously, not made of actual marble, but you can buy one's in a pan and then look like it. Oh, yeah.

Or, you know, you can get those soap dispensers that you can just buy and then you pour the hand soap into them. Just little things like that that will just, when you go to just wash your hands, or what are you going to do anything? You're not thinking, I hate my life. Changing the shower curtain. Do that regardless of anything. Don't use the old shower curtain that you've come into in a rental property. ever and they're really cheap shower curtains just go don't go for a pattern that you think is ironic because it will just look shit just go mine was a unicorn having a shower there we go

I regret it block colour we're talking block colour one of your three colours yes and a dark colour because you think like crisp white stevie said crisp white but not with the shower curtain because it weirdly takes up all this dirt from the bottom of it and sort of feeds up like those large trousers we all were in 2003 oh my god yeah they're very big flares yes and all the puddle water just went up your leg like a litmus oh it absolutely did. Look all that. And then it would leave like a tide mark.

That's exactly it. So you get a sort of weird tide mark up your white. Yeah. Go dark. And also then if you've got like someone like dyes the hair in the bathroom red. For example.

Someone will. I will. I went through a period of time of dye my hair red every like four months. And it was just like it just looked like someone had been killed in the shower. So yeah, go for like a dark dark color. And while you're there also replace the shower head again. You're like what? But totally.

Yeah. Cheap. And totally achievable. And you will be amazed. a how disgusting it was the shower head but also like how much a difference it can make to have a nice huge difference by a mattress cover oh my god oh my god buy a mattress cover don't do a me like i pro like who knows what sort of hideous diseases i could have a new mattress oh fight so if number one and if they're truly are saying absolutely not then get yourself a mattress cover and if your mattress is

horrendous what you can get is a very a cheap very thin duvet underneath your mattress cover will change your life. Oh my god, great idea. If you're somebody who likes to be on a slightly softer thing. Yeah, and wants as much distance away from you in the mattress as possible. Yeah, so obviously if you're like, I can't possibly afford one of those like nice, nice ones, you can afford to get yourself a very thin, cheap do you? Yeah, like really, really cheap. Because it's not going on to you. It's going on to you. And last one on the bathroom, get your toothbrushes in a lovely cup. And not just like any old cup. I have seen bathrooms where there's just toothbrushes are sunda. Oh, I can't.

And you're just like, oh, come on. Some self-respect here. Look, there's a mug in the kitchen, even if there's a shit mug pop it in the mug. Yeah, but to have it in then like, oh, I like this mug, put it in the bathroom, you know, have it there to be like, oh, every day. Just the more and more of those little maricondo things every time you look at something, you know, and you think, how can it possibly make a difference? Imagine every day you look at something and think, I wish for death. Or you think, lovely. Yeah, oh, I'm glad I did that. I've lovely, see, oh, my lovely basket of toilet roll. Oh, my, you know, those little things that say, I'm a human being. I had to think

because my big thing, which is, I don't know why, because I suppose it is quite easy. Maybe people are listening will be like, just do it. I used to never frame anything because I was always like, I'd get overwhelmed by like the measurement situation. Then like getting the frame delivered, the postal situation often isn't great. And then it's like, well, I'm at work and now I've got to go to a depot to get a frame. And then I'm like, this is too much, but I'm panicking. So I would never frame anything.

But then also, to be honest, I didn't really have much to frame. So then I ended up like putting stuff up. I don't really care about. So I saw in one of my friends' like rental properties when we were students, it was really cool, is that she'd worked backwards. She'd bought a really cool frame from like charity shops, like all different types of frames. And then she'd like collage interesting pictures into the frames.

So it looked like a choice and then put them up using the command hooks. It was just lovely because she didn't have any actual art to put up. She could afford any art. For what is art? What is art? If not, you know, that was art in itself. Because obviously, you know, if you've got lovely pictures that you want to have,

frame and what yeah frame them but there's nothing worse than like unframed stuff on a wall it just looks really cheap so either you've got a frame and then you've got a picture and it's like well the picture's too small for the frame get some wallpaper samples put them as a backing for the picture so then it does fit and then the picture's smaller so it'll just look nicer seeing the difference between just a picture that fills a frame and a picture with a white backing very classy suddenly you're like oh now we're batting it was intentional it was intentional it's art now whereas just like a poster a piece of paper thing blue tacked to the wall. And the difference in that was a few minutes of your time and a few pounds of your, of your wealth.

Yeah, because the frame doesn't have, you can just get it from a charity shop, it doesn't have to fit. You see those horrible, you're always looking at what's in the frame at carboots and charity shops and things. I mean like, what an awful painting? Oh, Contraire, stop looking at the painting and start looking at the frame, baby. Which you don't do because you're whole, you've never thought, you never, again, frames are boring. You've never had to think about things like that.

But frames are so good. Those tiny little details are the difference. It's nice. It looks so nice. It'll look so nice. It'll look so nice. Oh, Gamma. Any more?

Two more? Two? Three. Three. One tea is to go on FreeCycle and Gumtree and all of these things and eBay even. Nothing better than finding a good piece of furniture. And be like, I've got it on FreeCycle. Rugs, again, are things that you can get.

It makes such a difference. Especially you've got a cold house as well. A lovely rug. And I walked past one of those extremely expensive shops where they had several expensive. expensive Turkish rugs in the window but then someone obviously a very cool up they were like 50 grand a cool artist is on this sort of Mickey Mouse design

on the top of them and I was like I can do that I was like I could get Top tip top tip Do a Mickey Mouse on top of a Turkish rug It's relatable stuff I really looked at this I guess I'll send you all a picture of it

But like just getting any old rug They're so they're always in charity shops They're always at car boots Everyone wants to get rid of their rug Vacuum the hell out of it And beat it as well so you can feel like you know, it's the mid-war. And then do a quick Mickey Mouse spray paint design on it.

But since it's a crap, since it's a crap rug anyway, like do a cool paint thing on the top of it. Why not? But also, having a nice big rug means that you aren't freaking out about your carpet. If you're worried about things like that, you aren't, you know, it's just an added layer of warmth and color and stuff. Yeah, because my, like, the thing is being in a rental property, the first thing I think is the mornings being freezing cold. And then, like, your feet on the cold wood floor. And you're like, this is how it was rug so much nicer. Yeah, game torture.

And again, it doesn't have, those don't have to be expensive things. People want to give them away because they are the things of rental houses that then people can't take with them. Penultimate, if you Google Gucci chairs, you will see they're currently selling these 3,000 pounds chairs that just look like a chair.

Oh my God. But they are like bright pink and bright blue and bright green and then they have like a cover, you know, embroidered seat and then like a tiger on it. Okay. And you're just like, I could do that. Paint it a color that you like. Re-a-pulse that you think,

can't upholster you can get a bit of fabric doesn't have to be very big it can be anything even like an old like a dress that you don't like anyone but the pattern was quite nice but you like the pattern or even if you yeah exactly exactly that you don't have to be like where do i buy fabric doesn't need to be fabric find a chair on the street take your clothes off and put it on it guys and then leave it's easy is your good deed for the day it is so easy to repulster something you just involves sort of slightly prising the seat off which it comes out and then trapping the material you don't even have to like do it to size, do you? Just trap it under. Because who's getting under and look at the underside of your seat?

And who would? No honest gentleman would look at the underside of a lady's chair? Just tuck it in and then you're like, holy shit, I've transformed this thing. And it doesn't require a sewing machine, which is so important. Or any of the stuff. And crucially, they're for sale for three grand on Gucci. Oh my God, ridiculous. And the very last thing

from me is fill your home with... What could it be? Candles? No. Gandles, yeah. Candles are good. What are you going to suggest? fill your home with rice love no it wasn't that was plants oh yeah

we've got an episode it's called how to keep your houseplants alive or how to not kill your houseplants or something listen to that because it's very useful advice or maybe it's not I can't remember we definitely received a lot of messages informing us it was not useful okay but listen to it it's funny there is in there a list of the hardest plants to kill

yeah I've killed all of them And the ones that you... I drowned a succulent. How did I do that? Get some plants. They can even be some fake green ones in there, in amongst the others. Get fake plants. Get some fake plants.

Get some, a few reels. Fill it with green. Fill your home with love and laughter. Well, hopefully that helped. I think it did. Yeah, it made me feel better. I'm going to go stick some stuff on the wall. Yeah, I'm going to look at wall stickers.

I'm going to buy a plant and I'm not going to cry. If you relate to Steve it, by all means, maybe plants are not for you. No, all. You have a go at the frames, champ, okay? And don't get yourself, I was just thinking, don't despair should you find yourself deep on like IKEA hacks or, you know, sometimes there is, and this is a girl who's been down that road,

and she's telling you, there's no, there's nothing good down that them, their food. My thing's plants, her things are of arts and crafts, so it gets quite hellish up in there. Yeah. Do you remember when you stuck the spice to the fridge? Look, I saw this Pinterest thing that said you could make spices and put them in jam jars and magnet them to the fridge.

and so there would be glass and you could see like all the cinnamon and the saffron and all these herbs so I don't know what they are but I was definitely going to use in my cooking that I can't cook so I got those little jam jars

out of the hotel that you know they give you a breakfast oh yes apricot jam apacob jams for example stole them from every single table took all these jams home at the jam clean them out

bought these magnets on the internet I was so excited filled them up with spices glued my magnets on the magnets turned out to be weapon grade magnets they basically came out the pack And then I, they were in all this, like, special wrapping.

I was like, what the hell is this? They basically leapt out of my hands and smashed into the fridge and nobody could get them off. So there was just five, these magnets stuck to the fridge. No, jam jars because I couldn't get them off the fridge. No, there's no force. You couldn't get them off by force. No. So then you left and the magnets were still on the fridge.

Yeah, yeah. They probably still left to this day. Oh, yeah. And everyone would be like, I guess they come with the fridge because how else would these weapon-grade magnets have got onto the fridge. So, you know, you know, guys. Just tread carefully with Pinterest. There's like, these little tiny hacks, are they little tiny hacks? Or are they weapons-graved magnets?

Like, you know, don't try and transform, unless you really love that shit and give it a go. But I'm saying these beginner ones that we've said, those will transform you. Thank you so much for listening. I hope that you can take some of this away, make some of your rental home a little bit more cozy. Please send us pictures. We're on at Nobody PanicPod on Twitter and Nobody Panicpodcast.gum.com. Send us some... Right, so I think we've done all of the suggestions.

If we haven't, please re-email. I've gone through my emails. I think we've done all of your suggestions now. Send us some more. We want some more suggests. Please. And we'll see you next week. Bye.

Bye.