Most renters have probably heard some version of the same advice.
Don’t put too much money into a place you don’t own.
Don’t replace things that belong to the landlord.
Don’t make improvements you’ll eventually have to leave behind.
And definitely don’t spend tens of thousands of dollars renovating someone else’s property.
Imani Keal did almost the exact opposite.
The Washington, D.C.-based content creator estimates that she has spent roughly $30,000 to $35,000 over several years transforming rental apartments, according to reporting highlighted recently by the Sacramento Bee and detailed by Vox.
That money has gone toward projects including paint, lighting, flooring, furniture and extensive changes to her kitchen.
And here’s the part that makes her story particularly interesting:
Keal doesn’t own the property.
She knows that some of what she changes may eventually have to be removed.
She also knows the traditional financial argument against what she’s doing.
But Keal’s renovations produced something she probably couldn’t have anticipated when she started tinkering with her apartment during the pandemic.
They helped create her career.
What began as an attempt to make a rental feel better eventually became Imani At Home, a home and DIY platform that allowed Keal to leave her previous work and become a full-time content creator.
Her story presents renters with a much more complicated question than whether spending $35,000 on someone else’s property is financially sensible.
If you’re going to live somewhere for years, how temporary should you treat your own life?
It Started Because She Was Suddenly Home All the Time
Keal didn’t begin with a $35,000 renovation plan.
Like many unexpected projects from 2020, hers began because life changed almost overnight.
Keal has explained that before the pandemic, she spent relatively little time in her Washington, D.C., apartment.
Then lockdown changed everything.
In an interview with The Everygirl, Keal said she started her home account in June 2020 after struggling with being confined to her apartment.
The place she kept finding herself visiting was a hardware store.
Soon she was finding projects.
Then she began posting them online.
Eventually a friend encouraged her to create a separate social media account dedicated to her home projects.
That became Imani At Home.
What is striking about the story is how ordinary the beginning was.
There was no grand business plan.
There wasn’t a television show waiting for her.
There wasn’t even a house to renovate.
There was simply a renter looking around at the place where she was suddenly spending nearly all of her time and deciding she wanted it to feel better.
A 490-Square-Foot Studio Became Her Testing Ground
Keal’s earlier Washington studio was only about 490 square feet.
But she didn’t treat the small rental like a waiting room for some future house.
She experimented.
She painted.
She used wallpaper.
She changed lighting.
She replaced fixtures.
She worked on her kitchen.
She bought secondhand pieces.
She learned how to make small spaces function better.
And she documented what worked—and what didn’t.
In that earlier Everygirl home tour, Keal pushed back against the assumption that renting is somehow a lesser form of housing reserved for people who haven’t reached the next stage of adulthood.
Her basic argument was simple: different kinds of housing work for different lives.
That’s important because much of the traditional conversation around renting assumes that renters are waiting.
Waiting to buy.
Waiting to move.
Waiting to have more space.
Waiting until investing in their surroundings finally makes financial sense.
Keal’s approach asks a different question:
What if this is your real life too?
Then the Projects Became a Career
The financial side of Keal’s story makes her unusual.
Most renters who repaint a bedroom aren’t going to turn the project into a business.
Keal did.
Her home projects attracted an audience interested in renter-friendly design and small-space living.
According to her Everygirl interview, she eventually reached the point where she was able to quit her previous job and make content creation her full-time work.
Vox’s reporting on Keal put the amount she has invested in her apartment projects over several years at roughly $30,000 to $35,000.
But that figure requires context.
This wasn’t $35,000 spent in one weekend replacing countertops in a random apartment.
It accumulated across years of projects.
Some of what she purchased can move with her.
Some projects were part of the work she was producing professionally.
And the platform built around those projects became a source of income.
That makes the return on her investment very different from what another renter should expect.
For Keal, the apartment became more than her home.
It became a portfolio.
That Doesn’t Mean Everyone Should Spend $35,000 on a Rental
This is where her story needs an important distinction.
Keal’s success doesn’t mean spending $35,000 renovating a rental is suddenly good financial advice.
For most renters, it probably isn’t.
If you spend $8,000 remodeling a kitchen and move six months later, the landlord generally owns the improved kitchen.
You don’t get to sell the apartment for more money because of the work.
You don’t build equity.
And unlike Keal, most renters aren’t creating income-producing content from the renovation.
So copying the dollar amount misses the more useful lesson.
The question isn’t:
Should I spend $35,000 on my rental?
It’s:
How much is it reasonable for me to spend improving the quality of a home I’m actually living in?
Those are completely different questions.
Renters Already Spend Money on Things They Can’t Take With Them
There is another side to the financial argument.
We routinely spend money on experiences that have no resale value.
A vacation ends.
A restaurant meal disappears.
Concert tickets don’t build equity.
Neither does a weekend getaway.
Yet most people don’t consider every dollar spent on those things wasted because the return wasn’t financial.
The return was enjoyment.
Housing is more complicated because the dollar amounts can become much larger, but Keal’s story raises a similar idea.
If someone spends $300 repainting and improving a bedroom and then enjoys that room every day for four years, was all $300 wasted because the walls belong to the landlord?
Financially, the paint didn’t create equity.
But that doesn’t mean it created no value.
That’s the distinction renters have to make carefully.
Start With How Long You Expect to Stay
One useful way to think about rental improvements is to spread the cost across the time you expect to live there.
Suppose a renter expects to stay three years.
A $360 improvement works out to about $10 a month over that period.
A $1,200 project is about $33 a month.
A $3,600 project is about $100 a month.
That doesn’t automatically make any of those purchases wise.
But thinking about cost over time can be more useful than simply saying, “I don’t own it, so I shouldn’t spend anything.”
The renter who moves every year should probably make very different decisions from someone who has lived in the same rent-controlled apartment for eight years and expects to remain for another five.
Some Improvements Can Move With You
Another distinction matters.
Not every dollar spent improving a rental stays behind.
Keal’s projects have included things that can potentially travel with her, such as furniture, certain fixtures and decorative pieces.
For an ordinary renter, that suggests dividing improvements into categories.
Portable improvements might include lamps, rugs, curtains, mirrors, artwork, freestanding shelving and furniture.
Reversible improvements might include certain paint projects, removable wallpaper or hardware swaps when the original pieces are stored.
Permanent improvements might include built-ins, structural changes, permanent flooring or fixtures that become part of the property.
The farther down that list you go, the more important landlord permission and financial consideration become.
A $400 rug you take to your next three apartments is fundamentally different from $400 worth of tile permanently attached to your landlord’s bathroom.
Your Lease Still Matters
Keal’s story should not be interpreted as permission to ignore a lease.
In fact, her own advice emphasizes the opposite.
In her Everygirl interview, she advised renters to read their leases and run projects by their landlords.
That’s especially important before touching plumbing, electrical fixtures, flooring, cabinetry or anything that might be considered a permanent alteration.
Keal has experience negotiating those conversations.
During one kitchen project, she sent her landlord an email explaining what she wanted to change.
They reached an agreement about what would remain with the apartment and what Keal could eventually take.
That email later became the basis of a template she shared with other renters.
The larger lesson is valuable even for someone who never attempts a major renovation:
Ask before assuming.
A landlord may say no.
But a landlord might also agree to a change that improves the property—especially if the proposal is clear, professionally presented and doesn’t create additional work or expense.
Some “Renter-Friendly” Projects Aren’t Equally Friendly
Anyone who spends enough time online has seen the videos.
Peel-and-stick wallpaper.
Temporary tile.
Contact paper countertops.
Removable flooring.
Stick-on backsplash.
They look easy going up.
The more important question is what happens when they come down.
Keal has actually revisited that question herself.
On Imani At Home, she wrote about moving out of her previous studio and having to return it to its original condition.
That gave her the opportunity to evaluate which renter-friendly projects she would actually do again.
That kind of information may be more valuable than the original makeover.
A project isn’t truly renter-friendly simply because someone can install it without tools.
It also needs to be removable without causing expensive damage.
The Security Deposit Should Be Part of the Calculation
Before starting a project, renters should understand what they are risking.
If the lease prohibits painting without permission and repainting costs hundreds of dollars, that belongs in the project budget.
If removing adhesive wallpaper could damage drywall, consider that possibility before installing it.
If a light fixture is replaced, keep the original.
If cabinet hardware is changed, label and store every screw and handle.
Take before photos.
Save written landlord approvals.
Keep receipts.
A beautiful $250 project becomes considerably less attractive if it later costs another $900 in repairs or lost security deposit.
There Are Cheap Ways to Make a Rental Feel Dramatically Better
The best lesson from Keal’s work isn’t that renters need major renovations.
It’s almost the opposite.
She has repeatedly emphasized starting small.
For renters who don’t want to spend much, some of the biggest visual changes can come from things they can take with them.
Lighting is a good example.
Many rentals rely heavily on one bright overhead fixture.
Adding floor lamps, table lamps and warmer bulbs can completely change the atmosphere without altering the property.
Curtains can do something similar.
So can a large rug.
Artwork.
Secondhand furniture.
A better shower curtain.
A larger mirror.
New bedding.
Plants.
Even simply rearranging furniture can make a rental feel intentional rather than temporary.
The goal doesn’t have to be making the apartment look expensive.
It can simply be making the apartment look like you live there on purpose.
There’s Also an Emotional Cost to Always Waiting
This may be the most interesting part of Keal’s philosophy.
Homeownership is often treated as the moment when people finally receive permission to care deeply about their surroundings.
Until then, the rental is temporary.
Use cheap furniture.
Don’t paint.
Don’t bother.
Save everything for the future house.
But “temporary” can last a long time.
A renter who spends five years waiting to buy a house has still spent five years living somewhere.
Ten years is ten years.
Those years don’t become less real because the deed belonged to someone else.
Keal described home in an interview with IKEA as a place of refuge, safety and belonging—a place where she feels most herself.
Ownership isn’t mentioned in that definition.
But Renters Should Still Protect Their Future
There is a danger in taking the “enjoy life now” idea too far.
If improving a rental means draining an emergency fund, carrying high-interest credit-card debt or postponing financial goals that matter more to you, the beautiful apartment may come with a very real cost.
The healthiest version of Keal’s philosophy isn’t:
Spend whatever it takes because you deserve a beautiful home.
It’s closer to:
Don’t automatically deny yourself a comfortable home simply because you don’t own it.
There is a huge financial distance between those two statements.
A renter can build savings and still buy curtains.
They can work toward homeownership and paint a bedroom—with permission.
They can invest for retirement and buy a comfortable sofa.
The decision doesn’t have to be either “live like you’re moving tomorrow” or “renovate someone else’s house for $35,000.”
Most people belong somewhere in between.
Ask Four Questions Before Spending the Money
Before making a significant improvement to a rental, consider four things.
How long am I realistically staying?
A project makes more sense when you’ll enjoy it for several years rather than several months.
Can I take it with me?
Portable improvements generally offer more long-term value.
Does my landlord approve?
Get significant changes in writing rather than relying on a casual conversation.
What am I giving up to pay for it?
A home improvement shouldn’t quietly replace an emergency fund, debt payment or other financial priority without you realizing that tradeoff.
If those answers still make the project worthwhile, the fact that you’re renting doesn’t automatically make the purchase foolish.
Maybe We Need a Broader Definition of Return on Investment
Homeowners are trained to think about ROI.
Will the kitchen increase resale value?
Will new floors help sell the house?
Will a bathroom remodel come back at closing?
Renters can’t calculate return that way.
But they can still receive a return.
Maybe the return is finally inviting friends over because you’re proud of your apartment.
Maybe it’s having a bedroom that feels peaceful after work.
Maybe it’s learning how to build furniture.
Maybe it’s discovering that you’re good at design.
And in Keal’s highly unusual case, maybe repainting and renovating a rental eventually helps create an entirely new career.
That doesn’t show up on a property appraisal.
It still counts.
The $35,000 Isn’t Really the Most Important Part of Her Story
The enormous number is what makes Keal’s story clickable.
Spend $35,000 on a property you don’t own?
Most people immediately have an opinion.
But the more interesting idea underneath it is much smaller.
Keal stopped treating her rental as the place where she was waiting for her real home.
She treated it as home.
That decision eventually led to thousands of people following her projects, partnerships with major brands and a full-time career she hadn’t originally planned.
Most renters won’t—and probably shouldn’t—follow her $35,000 example.
They don’t have to.
Maybe the lesson is simply buying the curtains you’ve been putting off.
Painting the bedroom after asking the landlord.
Replacing the uncomfortable sofa.
Hanging the pictures that have been leaning against the wall for two years.
Or spending a Saturday making the place where you already live work a little better.
Because a lease may be temporary.
The years you spend living there aren’t.