How I Revamped My Student House To Be More Productive and Inspiring

Hey Friends,

Hope everyone's having a good week. I recently turned 22, and I have to say it feels really nice to be putting the craziness of being 21 behind me. The last year was pretty wild for me and a lot of things happened:

• I quit my job as a research assistant for the HIV vaccine.
• I had somewhat of a quarter life crisis, which led to me putting my dreams of being a doctor on hold to pursue my other passions.
• I got mugged.
• I got out of long relationship, which led me to randomly travelling to various cities to see old friends and make new ones.
• I decided to delay graduating by a year to pursue an internship at the Ontario Medical Association.
• I joined a fraternity and started a book club.
• I ran a half marathon because I felt like it.

The point I'm trying to make is that being 21 was rather interesting, but I am very glad it's over. That said, upon doing some reflecting, I realized that one of the most important things I did as a 21 year old was reorganizing and redesigning my student house to be a more productive and fun place to spend time in. By doing so, I was able to stay inspired and motivated about my work, all while having my own personal space that I felt proud to live in. I understand that if you're a student and reading this, then you might be worried about the finances required to optimize your living space. Don't worry, I'm a student too and I fully understand the financial struggle. That's why I'm going to be very transparent about how much I paid for everything in my house.

In this blog, I'm going to do the following:

• Show you how my house looked like before and after I took charge of redesigning it.
• Tell you the prices of all the things in my house, incase you want to do something similar.
• Give you my personal tips for revamping.

​Let's get started!

​How My House Used To Look Like

We essentially had nothing going for our place. We had no desks to study on. We had no dining tables to eat on. Heck, we barely had cutlery and glasses. All we really had was ugly looking furniture that made me sad every time I decided to take a seat.
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For good reasons, I don't have a lot of pictures of how my student house looked like before I took the initiative of revamping it. All I have is this 9 second video clip of my roommates and I at the beginning of our redesigning process.

The Breaking Point

I'm going to be honest. For a while, having nothing but the company of my friends at the house was kinda cute. Yes, we didn't have tables to eat on or much of a sitting arrangement, but at least we had each other (that was kinda cliche). That said, cute wears off pretty easily. I kept going to libraries or cafes to study, and I often found myself spending excessive amounts of time at other people's houses just so I wouldn't need to go home. Eventually, I came to the realization that I didn't have a place that I enjoyed being by myself. Yes, I could've camped out in my room, but there was nothing really in my room other than a bed and a desk.

The problem was that none of my other roommates were really interested in redesigning the house. They just didn't really seem to care, which was a problem because the idea of revamping the house by myself was super intimidating. At this point, I decided to call my friend, Rick, and tell him about all the problems I was having about not being proud of my living space. We ended up hanging out in his garage (the birthplace of almost all our crazy ideas) for the next couple of days to figure out what I could do. Eventually, he told me that if I wanted to proud of the place I lived in then I would need to take fully responsibility and push through any discomfort I was having. After all, great things never really do come easily.

I set out by making a list of a things that I thought would be practical to have in my home. Below were some of things on the list:

• Modern furniture that matched and looked sleek
• An area dedicated to creativity
• An area dedicated for school and office work
• Chalkboard walls to write ideas down and brainstorm
• A dedicated space to workout
• A dinning table, so everyone could eat together
• Cups, plates, glasses, and cutlery (we really didn't have much)
• Boardgames and other things scattered in the house so there was always something to do if guests were to arrive

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​Not going to lie once the list was made the rest was history. It was just about being patient and constantly searching the web for good deals.

How My House Looks Like Now

​I think a good place to start would be my room!

Now, I know this room looks super intimidating and very expensive, but rest assured it really isn't that bad because I either bought everything used or I found it on the side of the road. Let me breakdown the prices and how everything came to be in this room:

• The bed I bought off kijiji for around $50.
• The bookshelf and bedside table I picked up altogether for $7. My mom helped me search Facebook Marketplace until we found furniture that matched my bed. I was also super lucky to have a really amazing friend drive me to the house to pick up the items.
• The black table (my work zone) was given to me by my friend, Vandana, to keep for the year until she got back from here internship. (I'm going to need to look for a replacement in another 6 months 😢)
• The grey table (my creative zone) was free because I found it in a garage.
  
• I used to have a lot of cheap motivational posters on my walls that I bought in first year, but I decided to replace them with paintings from my friends and family.
• The chalkboard above my desk was made by me. I bought cardboard for a $1 and painted it with chalkboard paint that I got for $20.
• I'm not going to like the music equipment and tech in my room is very expensive. However, I did buy most of it used. If you're not into music or technology, you definitely don't need to invest as much as I did. However, I do highly recommend buying an additional monitor for your laptop. The extra screen real estate massively improves productivity.

Moving onto the living room!

• I got the couches for free because my parents were going to through them out. All I did was spend $30 on black paint to give the couches a more modern look.
• The foosball table got donated to us by Rick's parents.
• The chalkboard writing corner was built using 8 pieces of Dollarstore cardboard and $20 worth of chalkboard paint. It's honestly one of my favourite things about the house because a lot of my ideas are formed in that corner.
• I got the coffee table from my parents, which they found for me.
• The glass chess set on the coffee table was won for me-at the Rec Room-by this girl I used to go out with. The coffee table drawer also contains a bunch of board games for people to play if they visit. I picked up those games for dirt cheap from various thrift stores.

Now, to the exercise room!

I'm a pretty soft and chill guy, but for some reason, in the last year, my friends and I got really obsessed with MMA. That said, I'm really glad I picked it up because it was just something so out of my comfort zone. I never thought I would ever end up doing anything like it, but here we are. 

• The foam padding we bought off Rick's childhood Karate Sensai, for like $75.
• The martial arts uniforms I had from the year before when I was taking Jiu Jitsu classes. All I did was spend $1 on hooks to make the room look cool.
• The punching bag was broken, so I spent $10 on glue and tape to seal it shut.

Lastly, let's take a look at the dinning room and kitchen!

• This dining room area actually cost me nothing. I was going on a run with my friend, Rick, and it just so happened that a couple was throwing out this beautiful dinning table. When we saw it, we decided to carry it back to the house! (Note: I did have to spend $200 on a moving truck and drive the couches, and tables from Markham to London)
• The life size cutout of Ed Sheeran was made for me by a few of my friends when I was in my second year of university. It will go with me wherever I go!

Home Tips

1. Start with making a list of things you would want in your home that would inspire you to be there. Once you figure that out, you can start to look at prices and a budget. If finance is really an issue, you're going to need to get creative with how you implement certain ideas. For example, I didn't have money to buy actual whiteboards and chalkboards. I also wasn't allowed to paint the walls of a rental unit. However, I was able to nail in cardboard and paint the cardboard to make them chalkboards (#lifehack)
2. Walk around your neighbourhood. People are always having garage sales or throwing things out.  Remember the dinning table? I got that for free because I was just running around my neighbourhood everyday.
3. Don't buy things news when you can buy things used. Make sure you're using Kijiji and Facebook Marketplace!
4. Look out for deals and always remember that you have the power to modify things that you find for cheap or free. For example, the couches I got from my parents weren't very sleek and they didn't even match in colour. That said, all I had to do was spend some time painting the couches to make them fit my vision.
5. Always have at least 3 boards games and a chess set in your house. This way, there's always something to do. Board games also force you to be off your phone, which is really nice when you're hanging out with people.
6. Take your time with revamping your home. Don't expect to have your dream place fast. It takes time to come up with ideas, save money, and implement said ideas. It took me almost 8 months to have my student home look the way it does, and I have to say I was pretty lucky with finding things randomly.

Concluding Thoughts 

Revamping your living space is hard and it can even seem daunting if you have no support. However. if you really want to be proud of your home, then you need to take full ownership. That's not on easy things to do. That said, it's really important that you have a place that you enjoy being alone as well as a place that inspires you to work hard and have fun. Once you have that, you can literally do anything.

I hope this blog inspired you to consider revamping your own place. I also really hope this blog showed you that you don't need to spend a lot of money to make your home look the way you want it. Thanks reading and I'll talk to you next week.

Your Friend,
Farshad Murtada 

P.S: Shout out to my friends Nick Ho and Rick Sugden for really supporting me in making my dream student home a reality. We really did start with an ugly dump.