Advance Look Building Inspections

This nice enough guy but cost us almost 20K a week before closing due to his "misunderstanding"!

We had a home inspection done prior to listing our home to make any necessary repairs that might show up. One problem that was found was mold in our attic. Our realtor at that time suggested we have Pat/Advanced Look come out & do an air quality test in the living space to see if it was an issue. We were advised it was common to have some mold in the attic & it was only an issue if it affected the indoor air quality. We had lived there for 12 years & none of our family (5 kids) had any allergies or health issues. She emailed Pat, explaining what was found on the inspection report ("mold in the attic", mentioned 3 times), requested the test & cc'd me on that email. I couldn't personally meet with Pat since I was out of town but my 17 year old son was home at the time & let him in to perform the tests. We had also discussed a recent leak from a tub in the middle floor that might have showed moisture/potential mold when he was testing but that it wasn't related to the attic mold. He advised we should test the room below that bathroom as well. He did 3 separate living area tests. He had some personal issues at the time & forgot to send in my tests during the agreed upon timeframe but finally did & the report came back as "acceptable air quality". He even emailed me that he would be available to talk with buyers about his findings & reassure them of safety since mention of mold tends to scare people off. We felt relieved having these tests & his reassurance. We went forward with the listing & disclosed the mold in the attic. With a house our size, it took us almost a year to find buyers that needed that much space. They had an inspection done, which of course found mold in the attic. We advised of Pat's findings, sent the reports & told the buyer's realtor to contact Pat directly with further questions. A week before closing & after several attempts from them, as well as voicemails & emails from me & my current realtor, Pat finally responded & told us that he was unaware of the mold & that it would need professional remediation to remove it! I forwarded him all the emails that did indeed state "mold in attic". He replied that "he hadn't seen the emails, in case we ever needed to prove anything"?! If that doesn't admit guilt!? The emails were our initial communication so how else would he know about us needing the tests? He was preoccupied at the time of the tests but this left us & our sale in serious jeopardy! He came out to look at the mold & apologized for the misunderstanding. He also said the reports were only good for 30 days! I had emailed him multiple times over the year, advising of a realtor change & updating him on status of the listing! He never once replied or mentioned the 30 days! Most houses don't even close in 30 days! The main reason we had him come out was mold in the attic, again stated 3 times in the email & he said he thought it was for the mention of a recent tub leak! He even said the recent leak wouldn't have caused mold that quickly. So him testing in 3 places for a tub leak was unethical on his part & a waste of my money if he knew it wouldn't have shown mold!
We were already under contract on another house & couldn't afford to back out. We got a bid for the remediation which was thankfully much lower than most, not to mention used a different air quality tester after remediation that was also even cheaper than Pat! The buyers agreed to let us set aside money from the sale in escrow for the work since we didn't have any extra cash to have it done before the sale.
This took almost 20k we were anticipating to use towards our down payment/closing costs of our new home! We were hopeful we could sue Advanced Look for the remediation fees, having these emails & test results as well as his reassurance. After meeting with an attorney (& paying that fee), we were advised since we didn't have a "contract" with Advanced Look, it was hopeless & would cost more that we could gain. We were just out the money last minute & Pat got off with no repercussions. He didn't even offer to refund any of the $750 we paid him for his tests. Pat should be held accountable for giving us tests showing safety of a home & then not standing by his findings! Not to mention WE lived in that home all that time, assuming it was safe from his reports!

All we can do is write this review & highly recommend you take your business to Kelly, the other air quality tester in AK!

I had to use this after conflicting reports by other inspectors in environmental testing.

My realtor even used them to be educated about environmental testing. However, for some reason, the realtor did not trust this company. But, the realtor was not all that trusting neither!

The company was very thorough in testing and they know what they were doing!