How To Hire The Right Person When You Need A Family Lawyer: An Inside Look

I have been a local Fremont family law attorney for over 30 years. Most people in their lives will use the services of a lawyer on several occasions. It can put you in the very uncomfortable position of trying to make a selection of the best available professional who is best suited to address your concerns and achieve your goals. The purpose of this article is to provide you with an insider’s perspective from an experienced attorney who has advised thousands of people just like you.

Here is a checklist of things to think about, consider, and do before hiring an attorney:

1. It is good practice to go to the attorney’s office, look around, and make contact with the staff. The lawyer should be ready to deal with his questions and concerns.

2. Carefully assess the attorney’s ability to provide you with complete and comprehensive answers to questions at the same time. This is the surest test of knowledge, experience, and ability to be an effective communicator.

3. Ask legal counsel about your staff. Does your firm have backup attorneys who can cover all situations if there is a dispute? The worst is hiring an overworked attorney who time and time again keeps court dates due to their unavailability due to being overloaded and/or double-scheduled. Also, ask the lawyer about her personal. How long have they been working there and is there a family law legal help on staff? If the lawyer has long-term employees, she tells him that this is probably a good business deal and the people will have a lot of experience. If the staff are highly experienced, this significantly reduces any chance of mistakes and wasted time. Another problem is that if a firm is understaffed, it will inevitably end up paying attorneys’ fees for administrative matters. I have seen many lawyers type their own letters and also submit documents to file with the courts. These tasks can be handled by administrative staff or a courier service at a mere fraction of the cost of having a lawyer involved.

4. Pose this question: how long has this lawyer been practicing and how long with a focus on family law? Another question: They have tried over a hundred cases with concerns similar to yours. Find out if the lawyer is often in the same court as yours. Almost without exception, you will always gain an advantage by retaining an attorney who has extensive family law experience and who practices law regularly and frequently in the jurisdiction where your case will be heard. A local professional will know not only the local rules, but also the nuances of each particular family law judge in that community. While a new attorney may have energy and enthusiasm, however, he will not have the tactics, strategy, and time that he has spent many years developing that greatly assists the professional in representing the client. At a high level, and hopefully you’ll get legal advice of this caliber, the case will be half tactical, timing and strategy, and half legal theory. In family law, there is much more to going to the books and looking at the statutes.

As a Fremont family law attorney, I hope you find this inside look at the law office helpful when it comes time to pull the trigger and hire an attorney.