Jonesboro will be featured on an upcoming episode of the hit HGTV series House Hunters, a state realtor confirmed.
In the episode, which is scheduled to air Sept. 4, Danna Johnson with Crye-Leike Real Estate Services will show three properties to a couple looking to move to Jonesboro.
Jeremy Martin wants a home in the country where he can build a workshop, but his wife, Lauren Martin, would prefer something closer to St. Bernards Medical Center, where they both work as anesthesiologists, Johnson said.
Johnson said she was waiting for the right couple before applying for the four-month long screening process to get on the show.
The Martins, who attended Arkansas State University, are returning to the Natural State from Louisiana with their two young daughters.
"They have these big fun personalities. He’s the perfect Southern gentleman," Johnson said of Jeremy, whose brother Justin Martin appeared on the A&E show Ducky Dynasty.
"Lauren is kind of like the class clown. She calls me all the time and leaves me singing voicemails. She’s got that fun, outgoing personality. I thought they’d be good for TV."
The real estate agent said filming occurred in two parts from late January to mid-February, after the couple had closed on their new home. For about 10 hours each day, the production crew filmed the family in the house they purchased and then a second time at two other properties they will "consider" buying on the show.
It's a system that saves the company time and money in case a closing falls through but can inadvertently create other problems, Johnson said.
"Producers said a couple got in a major fight after a woman fell in love with a house she had never seen — it had just come on the market — and wanted to sell the house they'd already bought," she said. "Thankfully we didn’t have any of that.
"We custom-built the house [the Martins] ended up buying. They had to go back and find things they didn’t like about it, even though we built it just for them."
The other two properties that appear on the show have sold, she added.
Although a Jonesboro couple has appeared on House Hunters International, it will be the first time an episode has been filmed in the northeast Arkansas city. Previous episodes have featured Little Rock and Bentonville, and Johnson said she expects to film another installment in Jonesboro.
"It was different than I expected, but it is a lot more realistic than what a lot of people think," she said. "We had a great production team, and they made it a lot of fun. We filmed 10-hour days, and they still somehow managed to make it really fun for us. We laughed a lot."