If you're housing 1-2 rats for 1-2 weeks, the smell does not permiate the room provided there is fresh bedding. I kept 1-4 small/medium rats in a 10gal and cleaned them weekly on leftover aspen in my living room with no smell. Thankfully the rat eaters are eating again regularly so the tank is finally empty again.
-Yar
1.0.0 Albino Black Rat snake(Wafer)
0.0.1 California King snake(Oreo)
0.0.1 African Housesnake(Cupcake)
0.0.1 Honduran Milk snake(Blackjack)
0.0.2 Normal BP(Petey; Twix)
0.0.1 Yellow Rat Snake(Dijon)
0.0.1 Madagascar Speckled Hognose(Granola)[RIP]
1.0.0 Albino Nelson's Milk snake(Candy Cane)
1.0.0 Lesser BP(Creme Brulee)
1.0.0 Mojo BP(Brownie)
0.1.0 Black Motley Corn snake(Anisette)
0.0.1 Pueblan Milk snake[Fostering, Taco Grande]
0.1.0 West African Mud Turtle(Bulger)
0.2.0 Red Eared Slider(Squirtle, Turtwig)
1.0.0 Rat Terrorier(Ranger)
If you're housing 1-2 rats for 1-2 weeks, the smell does not permiate the room provided there is fresh bedding. I kept 1-4 small/medium rats in a 10gal and cleaned them weekly on leftover aspen in my living room with no smell. Thankfully the rat eaters are eating again regularly so the tank is finally empty again.
^ this.
As long as you clean the tank 1-2x per week with complete bedding change, the smell is not bad at all. I keep my leftovers in my closet and I've never had an issue with smell. Now, if you feed mice, that's a completely different story. Those suckers smell BAD.