It is not illegal to build housing in the vast majority of the US. Building neighbourhoods in existing cities takes city approval. You may want to throw up co

It is not illegal to build housing in the vast majority of the US. Building neighbourhoods in existing cities takes city approval. You may want to throw up condos on the waterfront or knockdown low income housing to put up your storefront or build low rises on farms. Those ideas could work but your low rises need millions of dollars of work to get pumping,electrical,fiber. Removing low income housing or building condos in front of the waterfront has tradeoffs for society as a whole you must be weighted. Most people understand this on some level and are not pissed off.