A City In Kansas Just Made Roommates Illegal

The housing situation in the United States these days is what could generously be described as “pretty f***ing dire”. Buying property beyond a used couch is safely out of reach for a large percentage of millennials, not to mention the housing that is affordable is being bought up en masse by companies like BlackRock as a revenue stream, which they definitely need. I assume they need to add a couple more feet of gold doubloons to their Scrooge McDuck money pit so they can finally put in a high dive. So what is a financially unstable generation to do if they don’t want to just fight it out for a sleeping spot under a bridge? Well, you get roommates.

Unless you live in Shawnee, Kansas, that is, where they’ve just made roommates illegal. The City Council of Shawnee just unanimously voted to ban “co-living” situations, defined as 4 adults living together if all 4 adults aren’t related. Look, first off, trying to count adults and only letting related people live together sounds like some weird pilgrim s**t. Weirdness aside, what kind of robot absent of empathy looks at 4 adults forced to live together and says to themselves, “this is actually my problem.” I promise you, 4 adults aren’t trying to share one stove for any reason outside of necessity.

Yes, co-living has grown in popularity recently. This is because housing costs have skyrocketed recently. This is a cause-effect relationship that most crows could figure out. Plus, part of the reasoning given for the ban is that… the practice is reducing property values. The Grinch would think this is a little cold. Your property values are skyrocketing at an unsustainable rate, forcing people to co-habitate, which then interferes with those values continuing to skyrocket, and your reaction is to call the housing cops? C’mon.

If you want to move them out, sure. You can do it as soon as you find any sort of acceptable housing at their current rent. If you can’t, maybe you’ll start to realize the 5 people eating ramen noodles aren’t the villain here. Also, you have to move all their stuff. That’s just for being a dick.

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