Where to start?

[Jennifer Hillberg]

I'm a newbie -- and maybe this is way out of my league, but need some advice. My friend has some valuable land right off the interstate in MN. Its on the exit and there is already a McDonalds, movie theater, and some strip malls. Developers are offering about $8-$10 per sqft (so about $10M-$13M) -- but they don't want to pay for anything until they actually have constructed the buildings and stuff. My friend and I were thinking that maybe WE could actually put a deal together...act as the developers ourselves. But neither of us has ANY clue where to start... where should we begin??????