When you show up professionally dressed and with a good demeanor it will make it much harder for them not to want to work with you.

(And yes, friends who try it have got a dressing down from me about it).

Contracts don't have to be fancy or complicated.  

Fancy cars, expensive gadgets, trips, clothes etc. just don't do anything for me.

But, let's say you could get $300/month rent if you did a fancy upgrade.  

I would much rather remove it and put in a fancy tile shower with maybe a hotel style frosted glass partition.

A place with laminate, that otherwise may not have fancy upgrades (like the one she bought), will look worth a lot more and make it easier to overlook other things.

They don't have to be fancy. 

There was fancy language used, but that is more or less what his book amounted to.I'm not super happy to see this fellow cited on BP as an authority.I am not an expert in housing policy, by any means, but I'm going to suggest that we can do better.

It was old and not fancy, but clean and well-maintained and within walking distance of campus.