Look: we’re not saying that the housing crisis that has gripped hundreds of cities across the world is entirely the fault of late-stage capitalism, but it takes a special kind of brain to accept rents being this high. Yet, despite the fact that working people have been squeezed harder than a teenage zit before prom night, landlords continue to attempt to drain the last trickle of pennies from desiccated renters, as shown recently in a viral post on TikTok about a particularly egregious example of a prohibitively expensive room for rent.

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@aserealty

The Ice Condo’s does it again with this front closet listed for rent at $980/4 weeks – but dont worry, its FULLY FURNISHED with a cot, bookshelf, and a clock. To be clear, many people don’t habe the choice not to rent things like this. Its not as simple as “just don’t rent it, then they cant get away with it”. There is a MASSIVE shortage of housing and affordable housing so there will always be demand for rentals like this #housingcrisis #affordablehousing #rentalcrisis #icecondos #rentals #zillowfinds

♬ Famous Mozart’s Turkish March(872150) – East Valley Music

Real estate companies will claim the invisible hand of the market is what’s driving them to put up ridiculously tiny housing units for absurd amounts of cash, but it’s clear that greed drives apartment listings like the above. The ghouls behind this particular joke of a rental are ICE Condos, which began by undermining housing in their native Canada, before realizing they could be parasites on a much larger scale in the U.S. Executive Director Robert Buckler is following in the footsteps of the recently deceased Sam Zell, who made millions from the forced homelessness of hundreds, if not thousands of Americans by putting apartment rental increasingly out of reach for workers with median incomes.

With that said, even with the incredibly low bar that scummy property barons have set, this particular listing is depressingly exploitative. Coming it at an eye-watering $980/4 weeks (so over a grand a month), renting this room in a four-bedroom apartment will also get you access to two bathrooms, which sounds like a decent deal until you realize that the so-called room is literally just a closet with a bookshelf put up inside, as noted by the video creator @aserealty. The final slap in the face from the parasitic company is claiming that the room is “fully furnished,” which is kind of true considering there is zero space to furnish the room, so a clock and a set of shelves technically does count.

TikTok users were able to see the funny side, with many commenting on the Potter-esque nature of the room. However, we think that even a letter to Hogwarts wouldn’t make up for how depressing this living arrangement is.

“But wait, if someone rents it, doesn’t that mean it can’t be that exploitative?” I hear you say. That would make sense if housing wasn’t a fundamental need, and not just for protection from the elements. Being unhoused makes it harder to get a job, as you have no fixed address, and without access to regular running water and food storage, people are likely to suffer some serious medical and social consequences. Plus, countless people bought NFTs, and they aren’t exactly worth anything anymore, so perhaps following where people’s dollars flow isn’t the best logic to use when trying to decide what’s value for money, and what’s a scam.

Chicago is by no means the only major city in the U.S suffering from the bloodsucking leech that is the real estate industry. New York, San Francisco, and Austin have all been particularly badly hit, and big cities like Atlanta and Boston have also lurched from expensive to unaffordable in the past half decade or so. This isn’t just an American issue, either: London is prohibitively expensive, to the extent that most Brits from the capital will simply have to wait until their parents die to have a chance of getting a house in their own hometown. Canadians are also suffering badly, especially in Vancouver. Then there’s Lisbon in Portugal, where locals have been protesting for well over a decade about increasing rents, as well as Mexico City, Barcelona, and countless other world-class cities that are being hollowed out by wealth.

As it is, most politicians and “respected” (read: establishment) talking heads are going to continue to blame things like the pandemic, zoning laws, migration, and inflation for the housing crisis, when the truth is that with the tiniest bit of regulation, the market could go from insane to at least somewhat bearable. Whether or not this has anything to do with real estate companies and hedge funds that are buying up properties also donating to re-election funds or running sponsored partnership articles is up for debate, although it would be a pretty short debate. For now, though, all you can do is laugh, or you’ll certainly end up crying.