Hondo H-50

Dreadnought body, satin finish. Ebonized rosewood fretboard. Mahoghony soundboard, black binding, nice ivory and black line inlays around the sound hole. No-name chrome closed tuners. Black painted headstock with Hondo logo. 20 frets, simple dot inlays on fretboard. Round label inside says "Hondo Guitars", Hondo, Texas, Established 1969.
Below that, "Hondo Guiter Company" (that is the real spelling on the label), Charleston, SC. Model H-50, SI 10102758. Made in Indonesia. Flower type pattern on the label.
Small pickguard, glued directly to the soundboard. Bridge is simple mahogony base, plastic bridge, black pins.
I'm almost afraid to admit what I paid for this in 2002. ($300) I would not pay that today, not even close. There is nothing that really stands out on this unit except the satin finish with the mahogony soundboard gives it a deep, almost Spanish sound.
Strap button on bottom is screwed in plastic. There is a black single bookmatch inlay line on the bottom and up the back. It came with a gig bag, a cheap one. Bought it from a very small guitar shop in Greensburg, PA, in 2002, for my wife who never played it. Now I play it some.

For a chord or strum unit, it is OK. I just today finally got around to sanding down the plastic bridge a little to lower the action. I won't mess with the neck again, don't want to put anymore tension on it. About half way tensioned. The action is now fine, and it seems to be holding tune pretty good, even with some minor temp changes and playing. Soundwise, it is deep. I think I would like to put a soundhole pickup on it and see what happens. The body is 4 inches deep, so it does have some resonance to it. It's not anything special at all, really. But for chords and strumming it's fine. I had nylons on it for a while, that didn't work out, cut the sound down too much. It needs standard Bronze acoustic strings.
There's nothing I really don't like about it, but there is just nothing that stands out about this thing. It plays, little deep, plain everyday unit. And anything above fret 15 is just about unreachable, so 15 thru 20 are basically useless unless you climb over the dreadnought. Fret edges have some rough places, but no fret buzz and no dead frets that I can find.
Just OK...

Action was always too high. Took time to work with the neck, but in the end, off came some of the plastic on the bridge.
Now, acceptable but a little more could come off. Found half-length shims under the bridge when I removed it. Strange. Left them there.
Fit and finish is pretty good, but more forgiving with the satin finish. No gloss to set off flaws. And the dark, mahogony finish is also forgiving. Like I said before, frets are finished rough on some, like they are a little too long to fit in properly. They stick out a little. Pegs are junk plastic, just plain black and the peg holes are tapered too deep, once in, it is almost impossible to get a peg out without having something to pry them up.
Again, just OK.

It would probably withstand live playing, as long as you were one of those people that do soft, easy listening music, or folk music.
Hardware is OK, tuning seems to stay put pretty well, but I don't trust the pegs.
It is a training guitar, plain and simple. You don't gig with it.

Never dealt with them

Been playking about ten months now, everyday. Have a lot of gear. Pulled this out today to finish the action problem, decided to look it up on the web, found the few reviews, decided to review it.
I would not buy it again, and if it went away for any reason, no big deal.
I don't love or hate anything about it except the fact that I paid too much for it back when I didn't know what I was buying. Oh well, it was for the wife.