Bluebird Mechanical, AI Diligence Brief delivered
Target: Bluebird Mechanical Services, commercial HVAC service & planned-maintenance, Phoenix metro, operating since 2009 (214 commercial accounts). FY2025 revenue $7.4M (+21% from $6.1M), adjusted EBITDA $1.31M; 58% of revenue is recurring planned-maintenance.
Verdict: Attractive recurring base and margin, but the diversification claim is false on the CIM's own customer schedule, $145K of the EBITDA add-backs recur annually, and the facility lease (owner-controlled) expires in 2027 with no renewal. Proceed with the items below confirmed before LOI.
Every claim below is traced to one of these source documents, and figures are reconciled across them, exactly as a real run reads a full data room.
No findings match this filter, .
Verified claims
Source: Bluebird_Mechanical_CIM.pdf · page 3 ✓ verified against source
“Approximately 58% of revenue is generated under recurring planned-maintenance agreements, with the balance from project work and emergency call-outs.”
Source: Bluebird_FY2025_Financials.pdf · page 5 ✓ verified against source
“FY2025 revenue was $7.40M and adjusted EBITDA $1.31M, compared with $6.10M and $1.02M in FY2024.”
Contradictions flagged
Two passages in the same document that cannot both be true. The brief shows you both, verbatim, and leaves the judgment to you.
Page 7 states no single customer exceeds 15% of revenue. The customer schedule on page 9 lists the largest account at $1,184,000 against $7.40M total, that is 16.0%, above the stated cap. The top five together are $3.03M, 41%. The diversification statement is false on the Company's own numbers, and the owner personally manages these five relationships, so the concentration and key-person risks compound. Verify the top-five contract terms, assignability on change of control, and relationship owner.
Page 4 presents the $185,000 of add-backs as non-recurring, owner-specific normalizations. The financial notes on page 11 show that $72,000 of vehicle lease expense and $73,000 of payroll to family members in active operational roles, $145,000 combined, recur every year. Adding back costs the business will keep incurring overstates normalized earnings. True defensible EBITDA is closer to $1.165M, which moves the price at any multiple.
Financial tie-out
A quality-of-earnings first pass: the same figures tied out across the CIM, the financials, and the tax return, and every EBITDA add-back judged on whether it survives a sale. The deltas and the defensible EBITDA are computed, never asserted.
The seller's $1.31M adjusted EBITDA leans $145K on add-backs that recur every year, and FY2025 revenue is stated $220K higher in the CIM than on the tax return.
“FY2025 revenue was $7.40M.”
“Gross receipts or sales: $7,180,000.”
| $72,000 |
Vehicle lease expense (owner + family fleet) unlikely
Recurs annually per the financial notes; the business keeps paying it, so it is an operating cost, not a normalization.
|
| $73,000 |
Payroll to family members in operational roles questionable
Recurs annually; survives only to the extent the roles are eliminated or genuinely above-market and cheaper to replace.
|
| $40,000 |
One-time legal settlement questionable
Survives only if documented as genuinely non-recurring and not part of a pattern of disputes.
|
| Seller's adjusted EBITDA (as presented) | $1.31M |
| Less: add-backs that may not survive a sale | ($145,000) |
| Defensible adjusted EBITDA | $1.165M |
| Implied EBITDA before any add-backs | $1.125M |
The seller presents $1.31M. After haircutting the add-backs that are not clearly defensible, $1.165M is what holds up, a gap that moves the price at any multiple.
Management-call cross-check
What management said on the call, checked against what the documents actually support. Both the spoken statement and the documentary basis are verified to source, so neither side of the comparison can be fabricated.
Two of management's statements are contradicted by the documents, and one is unsupported.
Risks & items needing documentary support
The founder personally manages the five largest customer relationships (41% of revenue) and approves every quote above $25,000. That is a single point of failure on both the biggest accounts and on pricing discipline. Make transition central to structure: earnout, a real transition period, relationship handover plan, and a delegated quoting authority before close.
Source: Bluebird_Mechanical_CIM.pdf · page 6 ✓ verified against source
“The founder personally manages the five largest customer relationships and approves all project quotes exceeding $25,000.”
The company leases its facility from an entity controlled by the owner at $9,500/month. The lease expires March 2027 and no renewal option is documented. Post-close this is both a continuity risk (no secured premises beyond 2027) and a related-party rate to test against market. Negotiate lease continuity or a relocation plan as a condition of the deal.
Source: Bluebird_Mechanical_CIM.pdf · page 13 ✓ verified against source
“The facility is leased from an owner-affiliated entity at $9,500 per month; the term expires March 2027 with no renewal option provided.”
AR over 90 days stood at $310,000 at fiscal year end. On $7.4M of revenue that is a meaningful slug of potentially impaired receivables. Request the full AR aging, bad-debt history, and the collection status of the oldest balances before relying on stated working capital.
Source: Bluebird_FY2025_Financials.pdf · page 8 ✓ verified against source
“Accounts receivable aged over 90 days totaled $310,000 at fiscal year end.”
The 21-vehicle fleet averages 4.8 years, and management estimates $240,000 of replacement capex over the next two years. That is a near-term cash outflow EBITDA ignores. Model it explicitly in the cash-flow build so the headline multiple is not paid on earnings that the fleet will consume.
Source: Bluebird_Mechanical_CIM.pdf · page 12 ✓ verified against source
“Management estimates approximately $240,000 of fleet replacement capital expenditure over the next two years.”
What to confirm before LOI
- Top-five contract terms, assignability on change of control, and relationship owner.
- Owner transition: handover of the top-five relationships and a delegated quoting authority.
- Facility lease continuity beyond March 2027 (or relocation plan) and a market-rate test.
- Add-back validation: recurrence of the $72K vehicle leases and $73K family payroll.
- Full AR aging, bad-debt history, and status of the $310K over-90-day balances.
- Fleet replacement capex schedule (~$240K over two years).
- Recurring-vs-project revenue cut and the two municipal contracts' renewal terms.
- Reconcile the CIM's $7.40M revenue with the $7.18M on the federal return.
Verification log, discarded before delivery
The model generated these while drafting. Each was checked against the source, could not be tied to a verbatim passage, and was removed before you saw the brief. This is the part most AI diligence tools never show you.
Investment-committee memo
The decision capstone, drafted from the verified findings and the tie-out above. Every figure traces to a cited number in this brief, and it is candid that the first pass still wants a formal quality-of-earnings review.
Pursue with conditions: a durable recurring-maintenance base at a fair multiple, contingent on resolving the customer concentration, owner dependence, the 2027 lease, and the add-back quality before LOI.
Proceed to a conditional LOI. The maintenance base is recurring and the margin is solid, but three findings move the price: the largest customer at 16% (contradicting the CIM's 'no customer over 15%'), an owner who personally holds the top-five relationships and all pricing above $25K, and $145K of add-backs that recur. Anchor valuation to the defensible $1.165M EBITDA, not the seller's $1.31M.
A 16-year commercial HVAC service business with 58% recurring planned-maintenance revenue across 214 accounts. The work is compliance-driven and non-discretionary, which supports renewal and pricing power in a tight technician labor market.
FY2025 revenue is $7.40M in the CIM but $7.18M on the federal return, a $220K gap to reconcile. Seller-adjusted EBITDA $1.31M; defensible $1.165M after removing $145K of recurring add-backs; implied EBITDA before add-backs $1.125M. AR over 90 days is $310K and ~$240K of fleet capex is deferred.
Customer concentration (largest 16%, top-five 41%) compounded by owner ownership of those relationships. A related-party facility lease expiring March 2027 with no renewal. Earnings quality (recurring add-backs). AR aging and deferred fleet capex.
Reconcile the revenue gap; secure top-five contract and assignment terms; build an owner-transition and delegated-quoting plan; secure lease continuity beyond 2027; validate the add-backs; size the AR and capex; and commission a quality-of-earnings review. This brief is a first pass, not a formal QoE opinion.
A brief like this can be shared with a partner, lender, or your IC as a private, read-only link, citations still clickable, that expires and can be revoked at any time.
Want this run on your own deal?
Upload a CIM and get a source-cited diligence brief, every claim verified against your documents, the unverifiable ones discarded.
Not ready for a monthly plan? Run a single CIM for $99, credited to your first month →
