Realtor Honore Frumentino (left) shows Farhad (center) and Vida Nikanjam around the house they chose through her Web site. At bottom are exterior and interior details. (Richard A. Chapman/Sun-Times)

So what can a veteran real estate agent do to penetrate today's fiercely competitive and ever-changing market?

Honore Frumentino, a North Shore real estate agent for 29 years, resisted putting up a Web site that looked like any other agent's. Many such sites answer only a few questions that prospective buyers or sellers have about houses.

At the same time, Web sites are emerging to make home-buying and selling a do-it-yourself business. Zillow.com lets users ask questions about property. StreetAdvisor.com lets users write reviews of their neighborhoods. LendingTree.com and RealEstate.com offer rebates on commissions. And ForSaleByOwner.com and Redfin.com help people sell their houses by themselves.

Frumentino said she wanted a Web site that would be a help to home buyers and sellers, rather than a "brag" about herself.

"I wanted people to have up-to-date information about the community, the schools and the real estate market," said Frumentino, who has been a member of Koenig & Strey/GMAC's No. 1-selling brokerage team in Deerfield for the past 18 years.

Frumentino hired copy writers and a Web designer. They worked on the site for eight months.

The result is TheNorthShoreSource.com, which includes tips for buyers and sellers; the Chicago area quarterly housing report; a mortgage calculator; magazine-quality photos, and links to public-transportation and parking-lot sites for commuters. It also has an "Ask the Expert" feature in which a question sent via e-mail is answered within a few hours, as well as an online market analysis of a user's home. Each home listed on the Web site has its own URL.

Twenty-five percent of the Frumentino team's business is generated from the Web site. Its latest upgrade will showcase new condo and home developments throughout the North Shore.

Kim Hadley, the Web designer with Imaginations/Everything Inc. in Ottawa, Canada, said Frumentino's Web site features a system that downloads the latest real estate listings.

"Our call to action was, 'How do we show that this agent is the expert?'" Hadley said. "It's about building up trust, and an image."

Farhad Nikanjam and his wife, Vida, found their new home with help from Frumentino and her Web site.

"I got the details I wanted," said Farhad Nikanjam, who had had his eye on the architecturally magnificent house for years. The Nikanjams live just a mile-and-a-half from the house, and they're now selling their current house in Highland Park.

"When I saw the wonderful house on the Internet, I had not chosen an agent," Nikanjam said. He chose Frumentino after he found tips on her Web site and the selling prices of houses in the neighborhood.

Jennifer Cummings, principal of Keytura, a Palm Desert, Calif.-based marketing consultant to Realtors, said others would do well to follow Frumentino's lead of showing clients "what's in it for them" by providing tailored information and expertise.