You might be subconsciously picking up on the fact that it's actually really creepy to build an apartment in a building you don't own.
Specifically, it should force us to ask whether such laws (a) drive up the quality of properties, or rather (b) merely make it impossible to rent a property in the price range someone might pay for this mall apartment.
I can't see how any serious-minded person could ask "Is the entire concept of property a bad idea, because someone can't rent a dingy apartment in a Rhode Island mall?". Of course the answer to that question is 'no'.
Our minds just generally go to the 3 year old's conception of property, "Its mine and I can do whatever I want."
But, of course, no. "Property" for grownups is a jumble of rights AND responsibilities.
It's good to question those, especially when it gets to what might be absurdities, e.g. Ted Turner owning a literal U.S. state's worth of land.
(I don't know how I feel about all that, really. I don't regard myself as a capitalist drone who thinks that someone like Elon Musk deserves to be richer than a heart surgeon. Jeff Bezos maybe, but, well, suffice it to say I understand the market is not perfect. But I also can't bring myself to think that it's more entitled - in the character-trait sense - to claim ownership to something I built myself, than to claim ownership to the fruit of other people's work, which latter claim is pretty much what the r/antiwork crowd are making. It's a messy argument to say the least...)