Market Intelligence... Last week's Dispatch, C&W: "Is There a Real Estate Bubble?" (Sep 21), generated skepticism that a "diverse, independent and decentralized" group can make better decisions than experts -- the premise of James Surowiecki's book, The Wisdom of Crowds.

Andy Lusk with LaSalle Investment Management in Chicago echoed the thoughts of many when he wrote, in the context of the Challenger or Columbia space shuttle disasters, "The level of expertise necessary for intelligent contribution in the field of space travel prevents the general public from getting involved. Expertise is not just 'valuable,' but essential. To the extent that predicting real estate markets requires a similar level of expertise, public opinion on the matter is irrelevant." (Note: This is the personal opinion of Lusk and not necessarily the opinion of LaSalle Investment Management.)

Intuitively, you would think that Lusk is correct -- that a small group of real estate experts would make better decisions than the public. But research suggests otherwise. It's not that you don't need experts. (You do.) It's just that adding non-experts to a panel of experts improves decision making.

After publishing last week's Dispatch, I spoke with Tim Welch, Executive Managing Director of Financial Services at Cushman & Wakefield about the C&W's survey. Even though C&W can draw upon extensive investment market knowledge (290 transactions valued at $10 billion so far this year), C&W still represents only a portion of the total market.

As Welch put it, "We are in a highly competitive business. Our clients are in an enormously competitive business. Different people's perspectives always results in being better able to help our clients." Currently C&W is tallying and editing almost a thousand responses to their survey. Welch firmly believes that these results will be a competitive advantage for C&W and for its clients.

--Peter Pike