Allison Bullard McNair

If you are seeking an attorney to help you with adoption representation, I would highly recommend you keep looking. Allison “Allie” McNair’s firm is called Building Families. Our experience with Building Families was unfortunately the exact opposite of their name. We were matched with an expectant mo...ther (EM) in South Carolina and our adoption agency recommended Building Families. We had concerns with the EM due to her poor communication with us and we expressed these concerns to Allie during our initial phone consultation. After the phone consultation, we were hesitant to move forward quickly by way of payment due to these concerns. A week later, we received an email from Allie stating that we had to pay her fees immediately because her office had scheduled an appointment with the EM, and the meeting would not take place if we did not pay. The whole purpose of this is to adopt a child so we felt pressured to move forward since Allie stated that there was a meeting scheduled for the next day and we didn’t want to miss this opportunity. Keep in mind that this meeting was supposed to have taken place the next day hence the urgent need to make payment. However, we never heard back regarding the scheduled meeting and we had to email them numerous times to get an update. On the 20th day, they finally sent an email without a prompt from us stating that the EM was not responsive and that no meeting had ever taken place. At this point, the adoption agency recommended that we move on as this was no longer a viable match, and they also advised us to reach out to Allie for a refund. When we asked for the refund, Allie basically said that all the work had already been done. When we asked how the work had already been done when the EM was non-responsive and no meeting had taken place, Allie still refused to give any refund. We made an emotional plea to Allie explaining our situation to her and we indicated that we are willing to pay what was fair for the attempted communication. Allie continued to refuse. Our adoption agency was so appalled by Allie’s behavior as they had not experienced this from any other lawyer in their referral. So, the director of the agency reached out to Allie to try to resolve the matter. Allie ignored the director for over a week before finally indicating that there will be no refund given. Because of this, our adoption agency will no longer refer any adoptive parents to Building Families. Allie’s continued argument is that the contract says no refund in the event of nonplacement, which we and the adoption agency understood that to mean given all legal documents signed but the EM changes her mind, then Allie can keep the money. But this was not done. How was the paperwork done when she never met the lady?? Filling in pre-made forms with an EM’s name doesn’t justify the fee. Unfortunately, EM’s changing their minds is a very common occurrence in private adoptions. Since this experience, we have been matched with another EM, who also changed her mind. But, both attorneys in our state and the EM’s state charged us for time spent attempting to communicate with the EM and refunded the balance, which is fair as we understand that they had put in time trying to make this work. Due to our negative experience, we do not recommend Allie/Building Families as we feel they do not have compassion for adoptive parents, and they lack professionalism. Anyone with experience with adoption understands the uncertainty of this process so you do not need an attorney who’s not on your team and who will kick you while you are down, like Allie. In addition, they were slow in communicating with us except to collect payment and to make us aware there would not be any refund. We feel they are more about keeping potential adoptive parents’ money than actually building families. We are now in the process of filing a complaint with the South Carolina bar over this matter.