Is she, though? I suspect the truth is that her rent is covering her part of the taxes, maintenance costs, any utilities folded into the rent, etc. The issue is A. how much profit her landlord is making off her (probably not very much, I admit) and B. how much profit her landlord thinks they should be making off her unit. Almost certainly B > A, but that doesn’t mean that the landlord needs the extra money or is operating at a loss.

Landlords, like anyone else running a business, deserve some profit if they’re doing a decent job, but only some.