How to find out if land is developable?

[Elizabeth Pratt]

Good afternoon BP family, 

I have a few questions about land developing and I was hoping to get some clarification. I am a new real estate agent and I'm not very familiar with land. A friend of mine wants to buy some land behind his house in southeastern MA. The land is .15 acres and is "potentially developable". My questions are, how does one go about finding out if this land is developable? As well as how does one best determine pricing for this? I did some research with comps and it looks like the land in this area goes for roughly 100K per acre for developable land. However, one recent sale in the area was 109K for a .15 acre lot, however, it was verified developable and had gas, electric, and water at the street. The land we are looking into is not yet cleared and abuts a dirt road. I believe it does have access to utilities with the exception of sewer. Any feedback or information is welcomed. Thank you!

[AJ Wong]

Local planning department. City and/or county.