HAPPY HOME REALTY

We viewed the open house listing for this home Saturday night. The MLS listing said the listing agent was Happy Huddleston of Happy Homes Realty, and his cell phone was listed. Because it was after 9:00 p.m. in Chattanooga, I texted rather than calling, asking for confirmation of the open house time. He responded that it would go from 2 to 4 the next day and would be held by one of his agents. After viewing three other open houses stretched from near La Fayette, GA, to this listing in Dunlap, TN, we arrived at about 3:40 p.m. and found the home locked and apparently unoccupied. A neighbor told us they had seen no one, and suggested that the open house may have been rained out. After walking around the house in the rain looking into the windows as best we could, I texted Mr. Huddleston again and then left a voicemail for him to let him know we had arrived and to ask if the agent who was supposed to hold the open house might be nearby and come show the house. Mr. Huddleston called me back and offered no apology or way of rectifying the situation, and did not even offer to show the property to us at a later time. He said that although the property is in the Central time zone, the open house hours were listed in Eastern time. He claimed that he was unable to specify this information in the newspaper ad, and that he was in Red Bank and unable to show the house. We returned home, just outside of the town he couldn't bother to drive from. Today, Howard "Happy" Huddleston, the founder of this business, demonstrated to us that he could care less about providing anything resembling professionalism or good customer service. I doubt that the newspaper couldn't print "Eastern" or "EDT" after the time, or maybe "from 1 to 3" instead of "from 2 to 4" if space was really that much of an issue. It certainly would have fit in his text message. The agent who was supposed to be there could stay until the listed time, local time for the property listed. At the very least, Happy Huddleston could have said something like, "I'm so sorry for the confusion. I can't be bothered to come about the same distance you did, even for you to potentially spend thousands of dollars with my client, but I'll call [the agent] right now and call you back," or, "...when might be a good time for you to come back and see the property?" No, he'd rather lose a customer. When we make our home purchase, we prefer to pay cash...to someone other than Happy Homes Realty.