The author rejects emphatically the “Field of Dreams” philosophy, “Build it and they will come...,” which clearly dominated the real estate development industry during the 1980s. This philosophy suggests that supply generates demand, a proposition that runs against fundamental economic principles. On the contrary, the book advances the premise that solid market research, based on a good understanding of the peculiarities and idiosyncrasies of real estate markets, is a necessary and crucial component of the real estate decision- making process.

The operational and bottom- line objective of market research is to help generate the knowledge and information that relates to space market operations and is necessary for assessing whether a project is likely to meet key development and investment objectives. For example, a typical key real estate development objective involves the maximization of residual land value (RLV) or, alternatively, profit per area of land. The two major factors involved in the calculation of RLV are property values or prices, and non- land development costs per square foot (see Figure 1.1). It is the strong link between property values and a property’s income- earning capacity that underscores the importance of market analysis in real estate development and investment decision making.

作者着重驳斥了20世纪80年代在房地产开发行业中明显占主导地位的“梦想之地”哲学，即“供应产生需求”，这是一个违背基本经济原则的命题。相反，这本书提出了一个前提，即坚实的市场研究，建立在对房地产市场的特性和特性的良好理解的基础上，是房地产决策过程中必要和关键的组成部分。

市场研究的业务和底线目标是帮助产生与空间市场运作有关的知识和信息，是评估一个项目是否有可能实现关键发展和投资目标所必需的。例如，一个典型的关键房地产开发目标涉及剩余土地价值（RLV）的最大化，或者，单位面积土地利润的最大化。RLV计算中涉及的两个主要因素是房地产价值或价格，以及每平方英尺的非土地开发成本（见图1.1）。正是房地产价值与房地产收益能力之间的紧密联系，突显了市场分析在房地产开发和投资决策中的重要性。