The article opens talking about boarding houses and moves on to discuss single-room occupancies which are the rental afforded by boarding houses. It is the rent

The article opens talking about boarding houses and moves on to discuss single-room occupancies which are the rental afforded by boarding houses. It is the renting of individual rooms that is illegal. In any case, there is _some_ limit to the number of occupants allowed to coreside in a given residence. States tend to codify minimum square footage requirements on a per-person basis to determine occupancy limits for a particular building.