It does the virtual heart well to see a real estate boot strap dot com thrive in the midst of the cyber carnage left by dozens of poorly conceived, venture capital funded real estate Web sites.

It's especially heartening when consumers with a penchant for home improvements can benefit from such a venture.

Cincinnati building craftsman Tim Carter's AsktheBuilder Web site recently received top honors, a "Best" designation in the Home Building section of Que Publishing's Internet Yellow Pages 2002 Edition.

The "Best" designation identifies what Que considers the best Web site in any given category and recommends if you have time to visit but one site in a category, the "Best" site is the one to see.

Given the nature of the Internet, AsktheBuilder's "Best" award could be a fleeting honor, but it's not going to be easy to top the site which offers home building information about everything from air filtration, appliances and architecture to wallpaper, windows and woodwork.

Carter says since he launched in 1995 he's spent less than $15,000 on the site, compared to the millions of dollars spent on much larger successful and failed sites developed by numerous industry outlets from national associations to building industry retailing giants.

"New to our 2002 Edition of Que's Official Internet Yellow Pages is our Best of Category designation where our authors determined which of the listed web sites in a category delivered the best overall user experience. AsktheBuilder.com was this year's clear winner in the Home category," stated Greg Wiegand an associate publisher at Que Publishing.

The site looks and feels like he's spent a mint, but that's more evidence of elbow grease he's applied by the truckload over the years. Que also awarded the site with the five star icon that goes only to sites that are tops in terms of navigational ease -- something a site must have when it's a mother lode of information.

And the navigation delivers.

AsktheBuilder's critical element, as any savvy Web publisher knows, is content -- well written, painstakingly researched, trusted content consumers can use.

Que says the foundation of the content found at AsktheBuilder.com is the entire archived collection of Carter's syndicated AsktheBuilder newspaper column, well written, easily understood prose carried by more than three dozen media outlets from the Arizona Republic to CNNFN's Financial Network. The site includes almost 400 of Carter's columns, building tips, builder bulletins and other information easily found with a powerful, well-targeted search engine and pull down topic menus.

Carter, a master carpenter, plumber and roof cutter of 20 years by trade, is also a bit of a media mogul who offers streaming video of his televised news segments and audio segments of his two hour weekly radio show .

It's no surprise, the Que Publishing recognition is not Carter's first. Earlier this year, AsktheBuilder.com won, for the third year in a row, the Construction Writers Association's First Place in an annual Web site competition.

His next act is a series of books about consumers most popular home improvement topics.

Meanwhile, just ask the builder. Get fast answers.

For more articles by Broderick Perkins, please press here.

Published: December 14, 2001

Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright laws.

Broderick Perkins parlayed a career in old-school journalism into a contemporary digital news service that really hits home. The award-winning consumer journalist, originally from Wilmington, DE, is founder, publisher and executive editor of the bootstrap DeadlineNews Group, a Silicon Valley-based editorial content and consulting service specializing in residential real estate, consumer news and related editorial consulting services. The DeadlineNews Group includes the website, DeadlineNews.com, offering real estate editorial content and consulting services, and its back shop, the Deadline Newsroom, an open house on news that really hits home. Perkins obtained his formal journalism education from University of Delaware and a journalism boot camp, the Institute of Journalism Education at the University of California-Berkeley. He went on to 20 years of service as a daily newspaper journalist at the Wilmington, DE News Journal and San Jose, CA Mercury News. Perkins covered housing on the San Jose Mercury News reporting team which earned a General News Reporting Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. He has also produced real estate, consumer and small business content for the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, RealtyTimes.com, Nolo.com, Better Homes and Gardens, the National Association of Realtors, Homestore/Move and Intuit/Quicken among more than three dozen publications. In addition to managing the DeadlineNews Group, Perkins most recently served as chief editorial consultant for Nolo's Essential Guide To Buying Your First Home, Nolo, and writes real estate television scripts for RealtyTimes.com.