I always operated under the naive assumption that people would knock down your door on April 17 if you hadn’t filed a tax return, but a shocking number of times I have to forgo lost wage claims because a client just hasn’t filed in years.
My client was the passenger in a vehicle driven by his girlfriend. His girlfriend was negligent. He lives with his girlfriend. They are not married. There is no common law marriage here either. Liability carrier is investigating coverage because they found out he lives with her. I've heard of exclusions for coverage of family members that live with the named insured. But I've never heard of exclusions for non family members. Maybe they'll mess around and deny coverage and turn it into a bad faith case.
We had a group of five attorneys spin off to form their own boutique about 10 years ago, specialize in tax incentives for business capital investments. We couldn’t pay them enough, and they were killing it with us.
That’s about 1/3 of my practice and yeah they’re typically pretty good engagements for both lawyer and client. If you can help someone avoid paying millions/tens of millions of dollars in taxes, they tend to be pretty a-ok with a 5 or 6 figure legal bill
Interesting. I've been wondering about the ethical issues of taking contingency fees on these incentive deals, and I mentioned it to our ethics specialist that we may be leaving a lot of money on the table and should look into it. Sounds like I need to follow up. For federal tax purposes, IRS ethics rules prevent lawyers from taking contingency fees. But that's not the case for state tax matters. For a state tax refund, it's cut and dry since client and lawyer both know the amount of the refund upon which the contingency fee is based. For state tax incentive deals, it's a bit more amorphous since the incentive arrangement is papered 6-36 months before the client starts receiving the benefits of the incentive and the amount can vary from projections (e.g., 10 year property tax abatement - the actual dollar value of the abatement isn't known until reassessment occurs once development is complete).
If you are able to generate business, as long as you are semi-organized you are always better off going on your own and doing your own thing.
My practice requires a broad geographic footprint. I currently don’t have a single case in the city/county where I practice. In fact, I have only one in the state.
You are also on the defense side. It's a bit different and I would 100% agree that that area of law being in a big firm>>>> going solo.
Client has a depo for a case going to trial in the near future. OC is a pain so this needs to be a thorough prep and not a quick one before the depo the morning of. Client blew off yesterday's scheduled prep call. Call them to set a call for today and this was the convo. My assistant: Your prep needs to happen today because CF wants to make sure you are properly prepared due to the nature of the opposing counsel. Client: I'm working today. Asst: What about after 5:00, CF can make himself available Client: I'm Jewish Orthodox and will be unavailable from sunset until Saturday night. Asst: We need to get this done and Monday morning won't give us enough time. Client: What about Sunday Asst: That's Easter and CF is going to be with his family celebrating Client: So... Quick prep monday it is. But really, its your fucking case that we've been working on for 2+ years and you can't be bothered to make yourself available to prep and now want me to take time away from my family to prep you on EASTER but have no problem citing your religious observence to make yourself unavailable.
Im certainly being way too narrow sighted, but that doesn't change my belief that if you have the ability to generate, you don't need to be giving a huge chunk of your fees to someone else in exchange for a secretary and an office.
The Texas house is about to hear a bill that would let a paralegal with a couple of years of experience sit for the bar.
Go to law school and leave with six figures of debt or get a paralegal certificate, have a salary for a few years, take barbri and voila you’re a lawyer. why would anyone go to law school?
Judging by your stories, would it be any worse? also with regards to who would do it - I think California still allows or recently only stopped letting apprentices sit, it’s how Kim Kardashian did it. Still a ton of shitty unaccredited law schools there.
did she ever pass the real bar? edit: quick google. Hasn't even attempted it yet. no shot she ever passes
maybe not her but you could absolutely take people of ordinary intelligence who actually do real paralegal work for a few years pass the bar after taking barbri or a similar course seriously
One downside of working at a larger law firm (that no longer covers social club dues) is that when I make a pitch for corporate and tax work to a country club tomorrow I cannot offer my services to the club in exchange for a waived admission fee
One of my legal assistants quit like 3 weeks ago out of the blue. Heard through the grapevine it was because her husband was insecure that she was working because he wanted to be the breadwinner. My associate came in and said that she got a text requesting a letter on our letterhead for the ex employee saying that she no longer worked for us. Ok? apparently her husband has been driving for uber eats and she needed the letter so that they could apply for food stamps. she was making like $75k a year. wtf
When you said he wanted to be the breadwinner, I knew where this was headed. That’s some pathetic toxic masculinity
I’m usually a fan of judges who write opinions with pizazz, but I also think I’d be super annoyed if I was on the losing end of the decision. A colleague emailed me today to flag the fact that the superb Fourth Circuit Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson ended a quotidian insurance opinion with an unusually introspective conclusion.— John Elwood (@johnpelwood.bsky.social) 2025-04-24T14:47:42.723Z
It was a death case in which the estate of the deceased lost the appeal to an insurer. Definitely not an appropriate case to fuck around and try to add humor to a decision.
Client has about $7,000.00 in retail meds. Clear case of liability, not in a particularly good venue. Client has had issues with headaches since the wreck--is on some fairly strong prescription medications for migraines. Imaging has shown no issues with brain. Was time to try to resolve it, and I am meeting with him to get some authority. Turns out he thinks his case is worth at least $100k and won't countenance any less.
Who are our Tennessee guys? have a potential med-mal referral and would like to send it to TMB first if possible.