Good luck man. I am going through my semi-annual crisis of conscience about my work and have been evaluating possibly hanging a shingle. I won’t do it because I am too used to my guaranteed paychecks and I am too risk averse, but I am envious of those of you that have gone out on your own and are doing well. Must be a great feeling.
Get on pay per lead for your area-NOLO and ELocal for MVA cases-call NOLO and ELocal about this. They won't flood you out with cases but you'll get enough to help keep the lights on. Get a line of credit and put up some google ads for car wrecks. Talk to some big advertisers in nearby areas and ask them to send you any cases they dont want. Find a side area that you can do to supplement income such as family law or criminal law. Get SEO for that secondary area. We don't even spend much money on SEO for family law and we get a billion family law cases. I don't do it but my law partner does and the cases come in non stop.
Did anyone else realize they put student loans on forbearance during the pandemic. I wondered why my checking account was swelling, then I put 2 and 2 together. Haven't been charged my usual $750 since March.
I've thought about just paying it off since it has an absymal interest rate, I think around 7-8 %. At my current pay rate it will be paid off in like 8 years.
I'd look at refinancing in October when normal payments resume. Rates are going to stay low for a while, so it might be worth keeping your cash on hand and refinancing at a much lower rate in a few months.
If you're in an area that does appointments for criminal cases, I would get on a list. You're not going to make a lot of money on it, but you can keep a decent workload when nothing else is coming in the door and pay your overhead. I did a ton of that when I first started out trying to build up business. Enjoyed criminal law enough that I have never completely given it up.
Of the solo practitioners I know, it seems to be the one area almost all of them started building with because from my understanding the rules are easier to grasp for standard cases and you get paid cash up front/monthly. But I’ve never done it so I have no clue.
So our office is "re-opening" this Monday, with King County (Seattle) moving into Phase 2. I don't intend on being in the office any time soon. I'm getting into an efficient routine working from home, and just enjoy it more. I have deposition in early July that are still being conducting via Zoom.
things are slowly getting back to normal here. there were a few weeks during quarantine where i didn't have a single new client. first time i've had a week without a new client since i opened my firm. 4 this week thank god
Mentally...heres my tip on making the jump. Suck it up, go through it. Its not "fun" and its stressful at times. I like all the things you are saying about your market and what you are willing to do. This year you will be like what the hell am i doing. In two/three years you will be like this is good. In 3/5 you will be like why didn't I do this sooner. Check out Judge Joe Anderson podcast about small town GPs. https://www.buzzsprout.com/1002688/...n-part-1-the-early-years.mp3?blob_id=12803548 https://www.buzzsprout.com/1002688/...e-federal-district-court.mp3?blob_id=12803155
Yeah, of all areas of the law, I was probably most qualified to do it when I got out of school, but I despised the work and while I generally got a decent bit of the money up front, I got so tired of trying to collect from clients who wouldn't pay outstanding bills. So I moved on quickly. One of my partners loves it, and I told him a long time ago, give me your PI cases, and you can have all of my family law cases.
Good question, I have trials tenatively scheduled in July and August in federal and state court, but no one knows.
Zero percent chance we have one this year. I think the criminal backlog is going to be extremely hard to move. Especially with the budget shortfall.
Confirmed no sooner than 9/15 in state court, but I doubt any go before 2021. I had one set in the Middle District of AL set for August that just got continued indefinitely, so no real guess on federal court either.
Does anyone do cyber security/data privacy? I got my first coverage case dealing with it (though minor). I think I’m going to take the CIPP/US exam. Get that “practice group head” on the bio.
Have a personal interest in it and almost focused on information privacy law rather than tax. Also been thinking about obtaining an IAPP cert. And then I look into it and say fuck taking more tests
I've had probably the best week of my career this week. Nearly 15m in gross settlements. Feels good, man.
Yesterday I: (1) got chewed out multiple times by a family law judge in front of a room full of lawyers. I have like 10 of these cases left but they are taking forever to completely close out. I haven't taken a new one in over a year and I still can't them all resolved. (2) settled a case for exactly what i asked for on the way to a doctors deposition. (3) sat on a toilet at my office and broke the seat . i told no one. it has a giant crack in it. i have to go to Ace and get a replacement after hours. All in all, it was a mixed bag.
Just got done with a dispositive hearing on a case I've got suing a real estate agent. It's unbelievable how much Alabama law favors realtors/sellers.
I represent a property company over there. So occasionally go over for evictions. Not Plaintiff friendly enough for me to invest too much time in it. Odd county. I am a big fan of the change of Judge though. Our firm had a big federal suit many years ago over the jail. U.W. popped them.
His honor is a friend. I used to use his law office for depos, etc. when I needed a spot in Tuscaloosa. I almost got to try one in front of him last fall, but the Mississippi lawyers opposite us pussed our and took the money.
This was before my time, but I've gotten to hear the story a lot. My partners had a 4:00 hearing on a Friday in front of him about the condition of the jail. He decides that they should all ride over from Birmingham to check it out. So by the time they get there at 6 or so, the place has been doused with bleach to at least cover the filth and stench. They go back for a hearing in front of him Monday, and Defense counsel starts talking about how Judge you know it wasn't that bad, or you would've shut it down. So he comes back with, I'm glad you said that, it has been bothering me all day that I didn't immediately close the place. So he shut it down then. They got the idea pretty quick and paid up and built a new one. Unfortunately, I didn't get to share in that profit sharing.
7 new clients over the last 2 weeks. we were averaging 4-6 per week this year jan-mid march. february is always our worst month by far as well. so it seems like things are slowly getting back to normal.
Ah, gotcha. I was wondering how you got in tight with UW. Yeah, they've always seemed to have some just cantankerous SOB judges in that circuit. SJ is a nice change of pace.
Anyone here do anything related to securities trading and business/tax structures for entities related to those things?
Most of what I do is fund structuring, but not for hedge funds or other active participants in public markets. Still may be able to help or point in the right direction, shoot me a PM if you have a question
colonel_forbin 's case getting some discussion on legal twitter. Not sure if you noticed the quotation modified language when reading the opinion.
Anyone in here know the word/acronym for law school training? I’m completely messing up the description, but I have a friend who films law school lectures or something. He brags about all he has to do is press record and sit back.
That’s it. Thank you so much. Apparently there’s good money for freelancers who show up and film this stuff.
last mediation as geico staff counsel. adjuster ignoring all my legal advice and driving themselves headlong into an obvious excess verdict situation I don't care because im leaving at the end of the week and it will be someone elses problem.