For the price point of my home, Smith Douglas offers exceptional quality and value.

Everything seemed great until we went through the walk-through before the sale. We found several items that needed repair or fixing. The walls were incredibly dirty, and the paint was equally dirty. It’s been a month since the sale, and many of these unresolved issues are now being treated as warranty items that should have been fixed before the sale. The builder keeps promising to resolve them, but they never do.

Smith Douglas made what can be a very stressful experience much smoother and we are thrilled with the final results. We are enjoying our new home and feel its value is excellent.

I am likely to recommend Smith Douglas to friends and family they have a great team!

This is the third house we have had built and the least satisfied we have been with a house. We were very excited for this house and have been very underwhelmed with the quality after moving in. We have found so many small issues that we continue to notice that lead to over all dissatisfaction.

Everyone was great to work with and made the buying process easy. Great communication and professional.

We closed on our new Smith Douglas home in Capstone Estates in July 2026, and the experience was smooth from start to finish. Amanda Cox and the team were responsive throughout, and the warranty process has been straightforward. Would recommend to anyone building new in the Chattanooga area.

Build quality is severely lacking, especially in areas such as paint/trim. Vents on roof aren't close to being straight, and it's noticeable even from the other end of the development. When I bring things up that aren't right, more often than not, I get remarks such as "That's just cosmetic", or "You've got to understand, these houses are built in 50 days. You can't expect everything to be right" (that's more or less an actual comment I received). I don't expect perfect. However, this is the third new home I've purchased, and by far has the most finish issues (missing trim, paint on floor which I'm *still* finding and trying to resolve myself, and so on).

Smith Douglas is definitely a good buy for the price, but this home style is not for everyone. It is working great for my family currently, and I would recommend a Smith Douglas home to someone who wants a larger house with simple finishes at a great price point.

Based on my experience, I would be unlikely to recommend Smith Douglas Homes – Chattanooga to a friend. The overall quality and attention to detail did not meet my expectations for a new construction home. However, the lead salesperson Suzette was amazing!

The communication was superior to my previous experience with other lenders and builders.

You can start designing homes that are more home office friendly. You are lagging in technology. Your sales staff (Rikael) was great and project manager (Landon) are great but your electrical and low voltage people still think it's 1990.

From start to finish, the whole process was smooth! The communication with everyone was amazing and whenever we had any questions we quickly got an answer. It was great all around!

Cammy and Noah went out of thier way to help us get into the house.

Beautiful home, great price.

Overall, the house is fine for the price but there is still a desperate need for improvement...

First, you get nickeled and dimed to death. In the beginning, you think a home will cost close to as advertised with the same features as the model, however you soon find out that everything is an upgrade. Before you know it, you have added $70k of upgrades from the base price. The model homes also have features that you cannot upgrade even if you wanted them. Change orders are also apparently not a thing despite being told that you can do one. I wanted to add garage door windows and was told that you could do a change order for a fee of $250. But come to find out, it is not allowable because all of the materials were ordered in November (the slab was not poured until around December 30th), basically misleading that a change order is possible because materials are ordered way in advance.

The garage door upgrade specifically stated, "upgraded carriage garage door." However, the doors are all the same and are a standard-looking door with no traditional "carriage" features. Extremely misleading due to a poor choice of words.

There was a discrepancy in the contract about a double vanity sink in the hall bathroom. I wanted to have two sinks, but the plumbers did not plumb it for two. Later down the line, I come to find out when the cabinets are delivered that it was going to be a single vanity. I am not a plumber, nor should I have to babysit the work that is done and make sure each step of the way it gets finished correctly. But yet I mention that it is wrong, and I am told the construction manager was not using the layout that specifically details in the PSA where all plumbing and electrical fixtures would go and was only going off the list of upgrades. This could have been a very avoidable issue. Yet I am told that it is too late to fix and that the drywall would have to be ripped out and it would set back the closing date to reorder materials. Corporate should do better to accommodate for things like this. I think the Smith Douglas saying is "your home, your way" but when a mistake is made it becomes, "my home, their way." Instead of trying to force the sale in Q1, they should focus on fixing their mistakes. I still have a punch list that was supposed to be fixed within two weeks of close, but it has been a month and not fixed. Some of the things needing to be fixed are on the exterior of the house too and do not require for me to be there to let someone in.

Along with plumbing not being correct, many outlets that were labeled on the layout in the PSA as "mid height of wall" were not placed in the right place and I had to correct them. I understand construction is not perfect but having two outlets directly next to each other instead of one low and the other up high, should be enough to give away those somethings not right.

Initially the fireplace was framed as a linear fireplace and not as a mantel, which requires different framing and had to be torn out. The wall to the stairs was framed to be drywalled in but it needed to be spindles and had to be torn out which seems like a waste of material and lack of efficiency. likely due to poor communication.

Some of the light fixtures downstairs were the swapped and not in the correct place. I had to point it out to them to swap which seemed to be a recurring theme of "if it's wrong and the buyer doesn't question it, then we leave it as-is."

The outdoor light drives me crazy that they only put one on the outer side of the wall and not two. It truly is unsymmetrical and lacks curb appeal. Also, when siding was put up, the hole for this light was cut too large. When the fixture was installed, it left an ugly gap that was noticeable from the road. I mentioned it many times and it still was not fixed. I show up to check on progress a few days before closing and someone thought an "acceptable" fix was to caulk around the edges (and they didn't even do a good job at that.

Because of the additional charge to install ceiling fans, I did not get fans. When I went to change out the hideous fixtures, they only hung them up with one screw in each of the rooms. How hard is it to drive another screw into the light. Although miniscule, it costs me time and a trip to the hardware store when it could have been done right in the first place. They even drove the pilot hole into the studs but did not put in a second screw.

The night I moved in, I noticed my front door handle was wobbly. I went to tighten it and look down to see that a bolt/screw is missing entirely from the hardware. I told the construction manager that it was missing and still has not been taken care of.

They did a ****-poor job on the landscaping in the whole neighborhood, not just my house. Although the homes have been graded okay to withstand some water, the yards and sod themselves are bad. They are extremely uneven and did not level out at all. They also did not remove weeds underneath the sod on the hill in the backyard, so they are now growing through the sod only in that area. The flower beds are appalling as well because of the clumps of red clay and rocks. I even had bottles, cigarette boxes and other trash beneath the pine straw. They should have tilled the ground and broken up much of that. Some of the plants were barely planted in the ground too. The sod was laid in late February or early March before it got warm. They should have waited so that they could water it. My grass was basically fighting for it's life to live because it was neglected from being watered.

Lot lines were not communicated well. There is discrepancy between what is mine and the lot(s) behind me that no one seems to know the answer about and I am not going to pay for a survey when they should know where it ends/begins.

Due to the tall ceilings and height of house accompanied with the square footage, the air units are barely rated for the home. They should put two units, one for each floor. Also, my unit was wired incorrectly and had other issues. Talking with my neighbors, many have had issues with their units. SD says it is a manufacturer issue. If this is the case, they should think about a new product.

Drywall seems to be cracking in the corners, and each room has nail pops within two weeks of moving in. There are also several rooms that have a weird texture on the wall that might be from poor painting or bad mud job on the seams of the sheetrock.

I bought a brand-new washer and dryer, and had it installed but it was cutting off due to lack of circulation. Come to find out, whoever installed the dryer vent didn't take a piece of tape off of it and it was not opening.

Water pressure at the kitchen is very bad. Construction manager said it was due to the fixture. If the water pressure is so bad, why keep installing that product?

The master bath shower pan creaks like crazy. I mentioned it and they said, "oh it has to settle" so I left it alone after that. After moving in it has stayed the same and you can hear it creaking downstairs when someone is in the shower. This is unacceptable and I will be submitting a claim on it before one year.

HOA fees are excessive despite not getting anything in return. $40/mo per home goes towards what? Keeping the front mowed? That is about it. There are no amenities. This is egregious for what you get in return. Money wasted.....

I requested for there to be insulation to be put into the interior walls in certain spots, mainly around bathrooms, so you can have more sound privacy and not hear water rushing through the walls every time a toilet flushed. I offered to pay but they did not care to even listen.


Despite the aforementioned, I did have a lovely experience with my New Home Specialist, Tracy. She did a wonderful job and made sure many of the problems were at least addressed on her end.

I love my house, but I was under contract 10 months before I actually closed. Also, our sales rep changed like 5 times over the 10 months.

I love the country neighborhood and my floor plan.

Everyone associated with the sales and construction of our home were excellent

The quality of the finish work

Loved our project manager Landen through the process so would recommend solely on him. Rikel the builders agent on the other hand was extremely difficult to work with and constantly gave incorrect information and also inserted our selections wrong, and stated our name as a client in bad taste to our neighbors.

For someone needing a good first home or a quick move in, I would highly recommend.

We got to pick everything about our new house.