I definitely recommend reading Lars Doucet's treatment[1] of this subject. You can skip to section 5 if you want the most direct answer to your question, but th

I definitely recommend reading Lars Doucet's treatment[1] of this subject. You can skip to section 5 if you want the most direct answer to your question, but the whole thing is worth reading. The short answer is that there are many ways you can assess unimproved land value. The "Multiple Regression Analysis" method I think is the most relevant here: you'll see from the linked article a table that includes all sorts of factors related to both aspects you mention: factors of neighborhood/community (some positive, some negative) and factors of potential (some positive, some negative). e.g. there is even a factor of "Proximity to natural disaster areas", which would definitely decrease the land value after this LA-area disaster. In this particular case, I would expect that Land Values would go down after the fires, as there are many more factors related to positive neighborhood features (which no longer exist if the neighborhood has burned down) than there are factors related to "development potential". Though of course it also matters how you weight these things. Anyway read the article, my summary does not do the subject justice! [1] https://www.gameofrent.com/content/can-land-be-accurately-assessed https://www.gameofrent.com/content/can-land-be-accurately-as...