The best rental friendly upgrades are the ones you take with you: lamps, rugs, curtains, and hardware. Spend there first, ask about paint second, and leave the floors, tiles and built-ins alone. Ranked by what each euro changes, the list below is short at the top and the top is almost entirely reversible.
What landlords actually object to
Most tenants over-estimate what a landlord cares about and under-estimate the one thing they do. In most tenancies the objections come down to four things:
- Holes they have to fill. Not one picture hook — a wall of them, or anchor holes for a 40 kg shelf. The line is usually “small nail holes: fine; anything needing a plug: ask.”
- Colour they have to paint over. A dark green wall means two coats of primer and two of white before the next viewing, and that is a €150–€300 deduction if you do not do it yourself.
- Anything glued. Peel-and-stick that took paint with it, adhesive tiles on a splashback, floor planks over a laminate.
- Fixtures that changed. A swapped light fitting, a removed door, a new tap. Even when it is better, it is not theirs.
What they rarely object to: furniture, textiles, plug-in lighting, anything hung from existing hooks or rods, and hardware swaps with the originals kept in a labelled bag. The deposit-safe test: can it be undone in an afternoon with no filler and no paint? If yes, do it. If no, email first.
The ranking
Ordered by how much the room changes per euro spent, in most homes, for a typical one-bedroom flat.
1. Lighting — €60–€200
Nothing else comes close. Rentals ship with one cool-white ceiling bulb per room and it makes every wall look grey. Replace every bulb with a 2700 K warm LED (€3–€6 each), add a floor lamp in the living room and a lamp on each side of the bed, and put them on smart plugs so there is a switch. Total under €200, zero permission, comes with you.
2. Curtains, hung high — €80–€250
Rental curtains stop at the sill and hang from a rod at the frame. Replace them with floor-length panels on a rod mounted 10–15 cm below the ceiling and extending 15–20 cm past the frame each side. If the rod needs holes, that is two to four small ones per window, which most landlords accept; a tension rod or command-hook rod avoids even those on windows under 150 cm. This one change makes the window read taller and the room larger, and it is the reason bedroom redesigns start with the curtains.
3. One large rug per room — €120–€400
A 160 × 230 cm rug in the living room and a 200 × 300 cm one under the bed cover the floor you cannot change and mark out zones in an open plan. Skip anything under 160 × 230 cm.
4. Cabinet handles and a tap aerator — €30–€120
Twelve new kitchen handles at €2–€6 each, same hole spacing as the old ones (measure centre to centre — 96 mm and 128 mm are the common sizes), and the originals in a bag taped inside a cupboard. Ten minutes, and the kitchen looks newer. The other kitchen changes that need no renovation build on the same principle.
5. Paint, with permission — €60–€200 per room
The highest-impact upgrade that needs an email. One wall or one room in a colour you chose, with the original paint code noted for move-out. Budget the repaint back to white into the cost; it roughly doubles it. Test the colour on a photo of the room first — Room Redesign in Homie shows the colour in your light before you buy a tin — and read the undertone rules so the one colour you are allowed is the right one.
6. Peel-and-stick, in the right places — €40–€200
Fine on tiled splashbacks and inside cupboards; risky on painted walls, where it lifts the top coat after a year in most homes. Test a 10 × 10 cm piece behind a door for two weeks first.
7. Mirrors and art on existing hooks — €30–€300
One large mirror (80 × 120 cm or bigger) leaning, not hung. Art on picture-rail hooks, adhesive strips rated for the weight, or the nail holes that were already there.
8. Removable panelling — €150–€400
Slat panels on a backing board that leans, or half-height board-and-batten fixed with adhesive strips into a frame rather than into the wall. It is the only way to get the effect of a panelled accent wall in a rental, and it is last on the list because the cost is high and the reversibility is honest but fiddly.
What to leave alone
- Floors. Click-lock vinyl over existing floors sounds reversible and is not, because the underlay marks and the skirting has to come off. A rug is the answer.
- Fixed light fittings. Swapping a pendant needs a qualified person in most places and the landlord’s fitting has to go back at the end. Plug-in pendants on a hook do the same job.
- Built-in wardrobes and doors. Removing a door to open up a room is a common wish and a guaranteed deduction. Paint the door the wall colour instead, with permission.
- Bathroom tiles. Tile paint peels; tile stickers lift at the grout. Change the shower curtain, the mirror and the towels — the bathroom redesign guide lists what that gets you for under €150.
Deposit-safe methods, by fixing type
| Need | Method | Load | Marks left |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hang a frame under 2 kg | Adhesive strips, 2 per frame | 2–4 kg | None if removed slowly |
| Hang a frame 2–8 kg | Single small nail or picture hook | 8 kg | One hole under 2 mm |
| Curtain rod, window under 150 cm | Tension rod inside the reveal | 3 kg | None |
| Curtain rod, wider window | Command-hook rod brackets | 3–5 kg | None on gloss, faint on matt |
| Shelf, up to 5 kg | Two small screws into plugs | 5–10 kg | Two 6 mm holes — ask |
| Mirror over 5 kg | Lean it | Any | None |
| TV | Stand, not bracket | Any | None |
Photograph every wall, floor and fitting on the day you move in and email the set to the landlord; it costs nothing and protects the deposit more than anything above. The moving-in checklist has the full first-week version.
Ask in writing, for three things only
Most landlords say yes to reasonable requests that arrive as one short email with a clear reversal plan. Save your asks for the three that need one:
- Paint — name the colour, name the walls, commit to repainting to the original.
- Shelves or a rod that needs plugs — say how many holes and that you will fill and touch up.
- Anything in a kitchen or bathroom that is not a handle — a tap, a shower head, a splashback.
Everything else on the ranking does not need the email.
A worked example
A 48 m² one-bedroom rental, white walls, laminate floors, one cool-white ceiling fitting per room, sill-length grey curtains, and a beech-effect kitchen with silver bar handles.
Week one: nine warm bulbs (€40), a floor lamp and two bedside sconces on smart plugs (€170), a 160 × 230 cm living room rug (€150), floor-length curtains on rods mounted just below the ceiling with four small holes per window (€190), twelve black handles at the old 128 mm spacing (€45), and a 70 × 150 cm mirror leaning by the door (€80).
Week two, after a two-line email and a same-day yes: the wall behind the sofa painted a warm clay (€55), with the original white noted from the tin in the cupboard.
Total: €730, of which €675 leaves with the tenant. The repaint at move-out is a tin of white and two hours. Nothing was glued, nothing was drilled larger than a picture hook, and the flat looks like it was chosen rather than assigned. The same money in a small budget makeover goes further in an owned home, but not by much.
