What to Expect During an Environmental Inspection

So you’re looking to purchase a commercial property, eh?

If this is the case, you really have to do your due diligence. Sadly, most people focus all their resources and attention on regular building inspections and market research but overlook significant environmental risks that could contaminate the surrounding soil, water, and air.
 
This is only the start of your troubles. These hazards are not only tough to identify (since these materials were mostly spilled or dumped underground in the past), but remediating the problem can also cost you a lot of money.
 
 

Purchasing a property plagued with these issues could cause financial and legal issues in the future, which is why you should include environmental inspection services offered by Certified inspectors as a key step in your purchasing process.

Here’s how our environmental inspectors can help.

What is a Neighborhood Environmental Report?

One of our most popular environmental services is the Neighborhood Environmental Report. To make this report, our environmental inspectors will use your address and scour more than 1400 databases to identify potential and ongoing contamination sites, as well as potential environmental issues up to a mile.

The report will contain the following information:

●      Underground leaking oil tanks

●      Hazardous waste sites and landfills

●      Signs of illegal drug manufacturing

●      Industrial or agricultural contamination

●      Contamination from toxic spills

●      Impact from neighboring properties

●      U.S. EPA’s top cleanup priority properties

●      National Wetlands Inventory map (1 mile radius)

●      Flood zone map (1 mile radius)

●      Environmental map (1 mile radius)

While not as extensive as other environmental inspection services (we’ll get to that later), this report will help you discover potential and historical hazards, which is enough to determine whether the commercial property is worth the price.

You can also use this service as a starting point for additional testing and inspections.

What is a Phase I Environmental Site Assessment?

A Phase I Environmental Site Assessment is the research of historical and current use of a property conducted to determine if any of the actions impacted the groundwater or the soil. These issues could pose a health hazard, present significant liability for the owner, and could directly impact the value of the property - making a Phase I report an absolute must.

The main question is, how is a Phase I Environmental Site Assessment different from our other environmental inspection services, mainly the Neighborhood Environmental report?

Simple, it’s larger in scope and generally involves the following practices:

• A site visit by our environmental inspectors who will visually observe past and current conditions on and around the property
• A comprehensive review of all federal, state, and local regulatory databases, such as the one listing underground and above storage tanks, and the storage and disposal of hazardous substances, among others           
• Review of historical records including aerial photographs, historical topographic maps, city directories, fire  insurance maps, etc.
• Review of ownership and tax records
• Review of records by local and state building, fire, and health departments
• Interviews with individuals familiar with the property, as well as past and current owners, operators, or occupants

All this detective work is extensive, but it will give you a complete picture of the site’s history and inform you of any environmental issues that need addressing. With the information provided by our environmental inspectors, you can make an informed decision on whether you want to deal with the potential challenges in the future, or back out of the deal and find a more suitable property.

Benefits of Environmental Inspection Services

While often overlooked in favor of other types of inspections, environmental inspection services offer an incredible set of benefits, some of which include.

1. Time and money savings

Both environmental inspections we offer will ultimately save you a lot of money, effort, and time.
 
How?

Consider the following example:

You purchase a commercial property, and you intend to open a manufacturing business. Everything seems to be going well until the day a state agency informs you that you need to seize operations and redo some of the development because they learned that the site is contaminated and poses a risk to workers. It doesn’t take a financial expert to conclude just how devastating this can be for your company.

Because our environmental inspections identify environmental risks before redeveloping or purchasing a property, you can avoid this dreaded scenario - which is more common than you may think.

2. Determine if the property is safe

Environmental inspections provide you with an overview of how safe the site is for commercial use. No business owner wants their employees or customers to suffer health risks, and we’re guessing you don’t want either.

Although an important moral issue, determining whether the property is safe also makes sense from a financial standpoint, as health hazards can lead to extensive fines and costly lawsuits.

3. Demonstrate due diligence for lenders

Our inspections, more precisely the Phase I Environmental Site Assessment is a great way to demonstrate due diligence for lenders. The reason why is simple, it proves that if you took all the steps needed to ensure the property is safe before purchase, your loan application will more likely be approved.

4. Get peace of mind

Purchasing a property comes with many responsibilities which will significantly grow in number once you start operations. Regardless of the use case, you don’t want to have potential environmental hazards in the back of your mind or spend time wondering whether your property is safe for commercial use.

Our environmental inspectors can help you reach a newfound level of confidence by providing you with expert insights that will without a doubt dispel any uncertainties - and you can’t put a price on that.

Recipe for a Stress-Free Purchase

If you’re in the process of checking out a commercial property but have any concerns about on-site health hazards, the team at Certified Inspectors can help.

Due to close to thirty years of experience in the industry, we have extensive knowledge and all the certifications in the book to provide you with the best environmental inspection services money can buy.

If there is anything wrong with a property, we can surely find it and give you some necessary peace of mind about your investment - you only need to schedule an inspection by requesting a proposal.

We’re looking forward to hearing from you.