Free Lawyers

Choosing the perfect lawyer / attorney would be the hardest part for any one. You need some one with great passion and professional touch in the profession to win cases for you. A lawyer should be more like a friend to you to cleanly understand your issues and problems. You need a lawyer who is specializing in that particular matter of concern. A divorce lawyer / attorney won’t be that much efficient in handling criminal cases / accident cases. So you should do your research before choosing you lawyer.

To choose your right lawyer, you at least do the following:

Talk to your friends / relatives who have gone through the same pace of life, ask them and get to know whom they have selected. Do talk to more than one lawyer / attorney. While handling with law firms, do talk to the lawyers / attorneys who is going to take up your case rather than the councilors / executives. Find what the lawyers are charging and their style of functioning. Some senior lawyers would take up the case and hand over that to juniors. We need someone who really understand our issues and find a solution for us. Do search in yellow pages / white pages / Bar association websites and read reviews about the lawyers / Law firm. Find out whether the lawyer is a member of local, state, or national associations. Determine the experience of the lawyer and the types of cases that have been handled by him. How you will be informed about the case progress and how often? Get clarified how long it takes to resolve the issues.

Choose the lawyer who provides you the answers that make you comfortable. You need a smart lawyer who will work hard on your behalf and complete all assignments in a timely and professional approach. You also need a lawyer who you get along with and like. By selecting the right lawyer will would save you precious time as well as money at the same time you can also reduce your stress level as the lawyer is going to take up the assignment.

By: Caroline Catherine

Divorce is not easy at the best of times. But it can be especially difficult when enormous legal bills add to the usually stress and strain. Here are some tips we recommend that you consider to keep your legal bills manageable.

1. Is a lawyer really necessary? Often the answer is “yes”. Where else can you go to find out what your legal rights and responsibilities are? But after you get the answers to your questions if may be possible for you to take care of the remainder of your divorce by yourself – possibly with just a little help.

The vast majority of divorce cases are uncontested – the spouses have agreed on the terms of divorce. The relationship is over and needs legal closure. You cannot expect the court office to prepare your paperwork for you but there are some affordable alternatives to law firms.

One is a do-it-yourself divorce kit. You can buy one of these for about $30 at most bookstores or office supply stores. They give you the basic information you need along with the blank forms you will need to fill out. It will still take some time to read through and figure out what they are telling you to do but it has the advantage of being the cheapest possible option.

An easier alternative is a little more costly, between $200 and $300, but still much cheaper than hiring a lawyer. The Internet has several divorce document preparation services which will send you all the forms you need, already completed and ready for you to sign. You just follow the instructions they provide to file the forms with the court office. Yes, this is more expensive than the kits but much easier and will still save you a great deal compared with hiring a law firm.

2. Try mediating instead of litigating. If you are among the 10% or so who have not been able to agree with your spouse on the terms of your divorce, before your lawyers start scrapping hire a mediator. A mediator is a specialist in assisted negotiation who will help you and your spouse come to an agreement on those touchy issues that you have not been able to resolve on your own. Mediation is successful in resolving the majority of disputes and can change your divorce from a courtroom contest into a far less expensive paper shuffle.

Mediation is going to cost you a few thousand dollars so you have to keep the alternative in mind. Sure, if you and your spouse can settle matters without a mediator then that is the way to go. But if the alternative is a court room battle you will both by out tens of thousands of dollars. If you can spend a couple of thousand and avoid this through mediation then the choice is obvious.

3. Free initial consultations are often offered by lawyers looking for your business. Before booking an appointment with a lawyer make sure the first 30 minutes or so will be free or else call someone else. It may be that after getting some preliminary information you will find that you won’t need a lawyer to handle your divorce and you can try one of the cheaper alternatives.

4. Understand how a lawyer’s bill is calculated. If the hourly rate is $200 then for every message you leave or brief conversation you have you will be billed at least $20. Each time you are tempted to call your lawyer and ask how things are progressing, take out a $20 bill and say goodbye to it – you might reconsider. A better idea is to arrange at the beginning to have copies of all letters written or received by your lawyer forwarded to you. You will still be billed for these copies but they will let you keep tabs on what is happening with your file without incurring any more fees than necessary.

5. Negotiate a flat fee with your lawyer. This may not be easy, or even possible, as most lawyers charge by the hour. But if you can do it the peace of mind of knowing what the legal bill is going to look like at the end of the day is worth making the attempt. It also allows both you and your lawyer to focus on the real issues and not on who to minimize/maximize the bill.

By: Howard MacKinnon

When people think of attorneys they often think of needing a lawyer to help fight a legal battle of some kind, a dispute over some valuable article perhaps, to defend a person that is accused of committing a crime, or to handle the business affairs of a busy executive. Whatever the situation may be there are many reasons to hire an attorney. Attorneys typically specialize in one type of law practice, however when several attorneys form a partnership the firm that emerges may practice many different varieties of law and specialize according to the staff of legal professionals that are employed by the managing partners.

Back in the early 1990s a television program depicted the arrangement of a law practice that diversified its assets specializing in many different areas of the law. There are many such firms in existence that have the ability to serve the legal needs of whatever their clients may require. Criminal defense, divorce representation, contractual law, real estate, tax law and estate planning are just a few of the broad range of topics that law firms are engaged in.

For wealthy clients an established firm of lawyers may be able to service each of the needs of their clients through the conglomeration of each of the specialties of the lawyers that are working for the firm. Managing assets and setting up incorporated entities or limited liability corporations is another aspect of the full service law firm.

There are many people that make jokes at the expense of the legal profession and the average person may believe that a world without lawyers would solve many problems, however the need for experienced lawyers exists because people are unable or incapable or governing themselves without finding something to argue about and fall into a dispute over. Without lawyers the world would come to a halt, because many people do not understand and appreciate that the legal profession is the grease that keeps the wheels of progress turning.

Attorneys protect their clients and the assets or intellectual property of their clients. Without lawyers patents protecting inventions would not exist, copyrights would not be in place and free enterprise as we know it would not exist. Family estates could not be willed to heirs and businesses would cease to be because in a world without lawyers there would more contentions and disagreements pertaining to civic rights and corporate ownership; and let us not forget about divorces and property settlements or taxes and legal contracts that protect the interests of all the parties involved.

Not everyone may have cause to hire an attorney to defend them in a criminal case, but it is certain that lawyers do provide a protection and a defense for many people to live in a civilized society and conduct their business and private affairs with confidence that a team of legal professionals is available to help them through whatever situation arises in life.

By: Billings Farnsworth