Increasing housing prices have created an affordability crisis in a number of major metropolitan areas. One way to address this crisis is to substantially increase the supply of housing in these areas. This article presents new evidence on why this is often very difficult. Using surveys and experiments in Denmark and the United States ($n=7,504$), we show that opposition to the construction of new housing is concentrated in expensive areas. We argue that this concentration of opposition to new construction in expensive areas is driven by selection into these areas by people with a strong preference over what their neighborhood looks like. That is, only people with a strong preference for a specific neighborhood’s character are willing to pay what it costs to live in an expensive area. In line with this explanation, we find that those who live in more expensive areas are more inclined to believe that the character of their community is worth preserving. These findings carry sombre implications for activist who want to build more housing in expensive cities.