A friend of mine, who has an orchard with peaches, pears and apples, that the first harvest of a fruit isn't its best. The fruits will not taste optimally sweet, however, by second harvest, it will be a lot better.
Just be sure to fertilize your tree at the correct times. A fertilizer with a high phosphorus content will allow the tree to make more fruits that are sweeter.

7 years? Do you know what rootstock it's on? I was thinking about buying a Honeysweet.

No, I got it from Stark's. The last tree I'll buy from them, because of the rootstock issue.

I thought Honeysweet was a Seckel type, supposed to ripen on the tree. So the small size didn't concern me.

I got one from Miller's and it's on its 3rd year of Neutral. Cut it back, got some growth a month ago. Enough to train a new leader? Nope. I have great hopes for my big Bartlett/Ayers next year. Good luck.

Supposedly Honeysweet is self-fertile and cold-hardy and also resistant to fire blight. It sounds like the perfect pear. I sure want to know what others have experienced. The rootstock I ordered it on is OHxF 87. It is a cross of Seckel.

Cummins' website says, "The fruit can be picked the 2nd week in September in Lafayette, Ind." It doesn't sound like it should have been over-ripe for you.

I remember a thread from a few months ago regarding bagged pears. You did mention that you had not had any problem with bagging them, but planatus put a link that was interesting regarding reduced quality. I decided not to bag mine after reading the article.

Could the bagging have caused this effect?

Here is a link that might be useful: BAGGING OF 'CONCORDE' PEARS .....

milehigh - everything is so much earlier this year, it's hard to judge ripeness. I was expecting them to be maybe getting ripe, but not so far overripe. Disappointing.

That bagging study was with paper bags and I used ziplocks, which are clear, so I don't know how much that study would apply.