Even in a relatively small region, the number and heterogeneity of parcels and the number of different uses to which each parcel could be put mean that the number of different ways of distributing these uses among the parcels will be extraordinarily high. How should we (i.e., society) seek to find the one land use pattern that maximizes land rents? In the United States, as in most other countries, we rely on a private land market to do most of the work of determining what uses of land are located on which parcels of land. The private land market works the way all markets do: Buyers and sellers agree on the terms by which land, or sometimes just the services of land, will be transferred between them. The most important aspect of the transaction is the price, because it is the price that reflects all the thousands of factors that go into determining the usefulness and desirability of using a particular piece of land for a particular purpose.