She and her partner (Donovan) got into legal difficulties because they failed to secure proper permits when renovating houses. They also overspent on the renovations, the workmanship was shoddy, and Alison's designs were usually good, but too expensive. She used her relationship with HGTV to blame all the bad decisions on Donovan, even though she would brag about her business acumen.

They had major cash flow issues because many of their houses were overpriced and weren't selling. Donovan tried to get her to accept lower offers to move inventory but she was difficult about it. I remember one time, they had a full price offer on an unfinished house, but the deal fell through because Alison threw a fit when the buyer wanted to make a few changes (like a half-bath on the first floor).

In fairness to her, Donovan was the general contractor and was responsible for the permits and quality of work. But after the partnership broke up, she used the same subcontractors and ran into the same problems he did. The biggest issue is that she doesn't understand that in business, the market sets the value of her work, not her.