The Rental Housing Clinic defines overoccupancy as “too many occupants as determined by the City of East Lansing’s zoning code for rental licensing purposes.”
Basically, your house is licensed for a certain number of people, and if you choose to have someone live there but not be on the lease in order to drop the rent, that constitutes overoccupancy. East Lansing takes this very seriously, and if it is the tenants who instigated the overoccupancy, not the landlord, fines range from $250-1000 PER DAY! EACH ROOMMATE could be fined up to $30,000. That’s serious money!
If you have more questions about overoccupancy, check out the Rental Housing Clinic’s overoccupancy pamphlet that gives all the gory details. They have tons of pamphlets on every topic imaginable, but this one is under “East Lansing Housing Law.”