Tell a random stranger that you write about real estate, and the first question is almost always some version of:

“So — how’s the market?”

It’s a question that’s impossible to answer succinctly. Market for what? For multifamily? For office? For industrial? For retail?

This is further complicated by the fact that the asset class is only half the question. Office in San Francisco or in Miami? Multifamily in New York or in Atlanta? Industrial in Northern Virginia or Texas? Retail in Los Angeles or in Denver?

There are different answers to all those questions.

Which is one of the reasons why something like our annual Owners issue is such a valuable tool in the hands of Commercial Observer readers.

While the Owners we include are sometimes a little more weighted toward New York City and its office market, it’s not as though we don’t have Access Industries’ Jonah Sonnenborn to give his view on the South Florida hospitality market. Or Oliver Carr to talk about Washington, D.C. Or Charles Cohen to talk about the tenants he’s been wrangling at the Pacific Design Center in Southern California.

These are the players who are seeing the action up close, who are making decisions every day, and who have graciously agreed to explain their thinking.

In addition to exploring the thinking behind business decisions, we also give each of the Owners space to talk a little about who they are as individuals. What do they read? What do they eat? What was their nickname growing up? Who would play them in a movie version of their lives? (Our favorite answer to the last question would be Larry Silverstein’s pick — but Jeff Gural gives him a run for his money.)

And, while plenty of these owners are extremely well trained in keeping themselves from saying the kinds of things that would rattle their investors, terrify their lenders or delight their rivals, we’re always amazed at the insights that come out of each Owners issue. The answers (for the most part) are not canned — they’re real. Every year we learn more and more about who is shaping the real estate scene and why.

Soak it up.