Pre-listing for a subdivision?

[Damon Gillette]

My dad is a farmer and is considering subdividing some of his land into approximately 22 1-2 acre lots. We've talked to builders and realtors and they are very optimistic and encouraging but honestly the realtors in my area are pathetic and I haven't found one that I trust.  Brother and I feel pretty good about moving forward with the subdivision but dad is not convinced the lots will sell quickly enough.  So my question is how can we get a better gauge of the level of demand for this type of property?  Is there a way we can legally do some kind of pre-listing before we go ahead with the subdivision?  I saw that Zillow has some kind of pre- listing but seems you have to be a realtor.  The realtor we are working with says "that is illegal" without much explanation.  Brother and I are working on getting our realtors license because these realtors in our area frankly aren't worth a dime.  Any advice on how we can better gauge the demand?  Realtor acts like we need to keep it all quiet until the subdivision is approved but I want to get the word out and find out how much interest there is.