Lee Levitt was nine years old when his parents bought the first family Volvo station wagon. That Volvo, says the Internet and business consultant, took him through puberty, learning to drive, high school, college, and thousands of miles after that. “I fell in love with Swedish engineering while sitting in the way back of our family wagon,” Levitt remembers. “I’ve been involved with Volvos ever since.”

While Levitt is a partner in Acelera Group, a profit-making business development and Internet marketing company (www.aceleragroup.com), he is also the main man behind Swedishbricks.net, the free Web site where Volvo owners and enthusiasts have become a thriving online community. “The goal at SwedishBricks is to be a community where people give back what they get,” explains Levitt. “As much as people get in the way of resources, advice and information is the measure of how much they should give back.”

For Levitt, the Web site is his way of providing a place to play for those who have common interests. And while people have a good time online, Swedishbricks.net is also a place to get money-saving tips from fellow Volvo owners and mechanics. For example, if someone owned a 1974 Volvo 140 and asked how to change the rings, the answer might appear in five minutes or less. “With an online community of 1,500 people worldwide, and up to 6,000 visitors to the Web site each week, there’s no limit to the questions, answers, advice and information that flows.”

Years ago, SwedishBricks was just a mailing list of Volvo enthusiasts. When Levitt inherited the list from original founder Tim Takahashi, he incorporated the names and addresses into a Web site. Having previously taken two Internet software products to market, including a mail server that still runs the mailing list today, Levitt decided to promote SwedishBricks as a public online community. He’s never been sorry, and considers the site a success. “I define a successful community Web site as a self-maintaining group of people that don’t require a lot of help; enough people are involved for it to be a useful resource and self-sustaining.”

Aside from running a Web site that deals with Volvos of every kind, Levitt has owned almost every four-cylinder Volvo ever made, including wagons, sports cars and coupes. After driving the family wagon for years, he finally bought his own Volvo, a P1800 classic red sports car, chassis number 18359. Since then, he’s bought and sold more Volvos than he can count.

Though Levitt reads more than 100 e-mails a day via SwedishBricks, he carries on a life outside of the Internet. Through his consulting business, Acelera, he serves such clients as British Airways and State Street Bank in Boston. Levitt is also a competitive cyclist in the over-40 category, runs a second Web site for the city in which he lives called Needhamonline.com, is married to Amy, has an eight-year-old daughter Rachel and ten-year-old son Jonathon. Both Amy and Jonathan have Web sites of their own: amydoodle.com and funwithpaper.com.

As for SwedishBricks.net, Levitt says he’ll continue to pour his time into the growing community. “The more people that contribute, the bigger the resource becomes. It feeds on itself and multiplies, becoming a very powerful force. There’s no better way for people to link with those around the world to get advice and counsel at no cost.”