How to Find the Best Divorce Lawyer in Allentown Pennsylvania?  - Allentown Divorce Lawyer | Divorce Attorney Allentown

It’s a trick question. You do not need to locate the best divorce attorney in Allentown, Pennsylvania There are several divorce lawyers in Allentown that would likely do an equally good effort for you. It would undoubtedly be out of the question to determine which one is the “absolute best.”

The real concern for you, the Allentown divorce client, is the way to discover just one of those Allentown best divorce attorneys at the precise levels of assistance and price for the aspects of your particular circumstances – while staying away from all of the common, and occasionally harmful, risks of the Allentown divorce attorney selection choice.

If you recognize what those risks are (I will tell you in this blog post) and if you have the proper attitude, namely that you wish to make your Allentown divorce attorney fit your case and not permit the lawyer to force your case to fit his or her stiff practice profile, after that you increase significantly your possibilities of nailing the Allentown divorce attorney hiring choice. Getting you through that decision effectively is the objective of this blog post.

Initially, let’s note the 4 aspects to stay away from:

1. Avoid Do-It-Yourself Divorce:

It is entirely possible, repeat POSSIBLE, to acquire free family law forms from Pennsylvania’s judicial council or family court internet sites. Those free divorce forms will be uncompleted, obviously. You can at that point try to complete and record the forms at your regional Lehigh County divorce court on your own without specialist assistance. This is feasible – but very improbable, extremely challenging, confusing, irritating and exceptionally slow.

Do it yourself divorce would certainly be essentially unattainable, and not sensible even to attempt, in any  complicated or disputed family law action. It would certainly be very improbable to be effective if you have minor children of the marriage or have any property or financial obligations to be detailed in the case or have custody, visitation or support agreements in your proceedings. It would absolutely be foolish in a case involving domestic violence. Do it yourself would certainly likewise be tough if you have a job or if you place any kind of value on your own time. Family law forms and processeses are created by attorneys to puzzle you to ensure that you employ – an attorney.

Please excuse me if I do not spend way too much time on the DIY risk. My experience on the front lines of California divorce for the past 40+ years is that folks that begin the divorce procedure with the intent to try to obtain a free divorce are most likely to  try DIY divorce regardless of what. For some reason, probably financial, there is absolutely nothing I‘ve had the ability to discover to persuade them not to.

Do It Yourself in Family Law is typically fake affordability. You WILL probably screw it up, and screwed-up cases are much more problematic and really expensive to correct and conclude. Do not play this game. The system is created by attorneys to puzzle you and force you to employ a divorce attorney. There are now affordable choices available– see listed below. Do not go it alone in Divorce or Family Law.

2. Avoid Traditional Allentown Family Law Attorneys if Your Case is Likely to be Uncontested:

An uncontested divorce is merely one in which the litigants will not be challenging any issues, including the divorce itself. The litigants do not have to be happy and they do not have to care for each other. They are either entirely or mainly in agreement on all issues and are sensible enough to acknowledge that standard full-representation divorce attorneys (with massive retainers and billable hrs) would certainly be the only winners if they disputed reasonably insignificant issues in their divorce.

Traditional full representation by a neighborhood Allentown divorce attorney is when that attorney will represent you in all facets of your divorce matter. It is very likely to be a good professional service, but it is expensive.

If you have a disputed matter, a complex matter, a high-value matter or a case that includes domestic violence or the threat of domestic violence, full representation by a Allentown divorce attorney is NOT to be evaded. It is a necessity.

A disputed matter denotes that you and your spouse/partner are contesting ANY issue in the matter. A complicated matter contains legal intricacies such as tax issues, active business issues, a special needs child of the marriage or any one of many other intricate legal scenarios. A high-value case means that your marital estate is huge. There is no specific dollar limit. Absolutely, if you have a high 7-figure net marital estate or greater, that is a high-value matter.

If you suspect that you have a disputed,complicated or high-value matter, you do. Work with an experienced and expensive Allentown divorce attorney for full conventional representation. Seek a certified Family Law specialist. You will not be sorry you did.

If you do NOT have a disputed, complex, high-value or domestic violence case, you do NOT require conventional full representation by a Allentown divorce attorney. In fact, under those circumstances, full legal representation by a Allentown divorce attorney ends up being a risk to your financial position. Avoid it.

Of course, if you call or email a conventional Allentown divorce attorney, they will not tell you that you do not require their full representation service. In fact, they will try to terrify the crap out of you by advising you that you absolutely need their service which your case will get screwed up without it.

That could transpire– even in a non-DIY case. I’ll tell you next how to stay away from possibly 90+% of the prospective risk of getting your case screwed up if you do not go DIY and you DON’T employ a conventional Allentown divorce lawyer on a complete representation basis.

Your case could also possibly get screwed up if you DID employ a complete representation Allentown divorce lawyer. That’s also not probable, but it could possibly occur.

Nevertheless, what will DEFINITELY occur if you employ a conventional full representation Allentown divorce lawyer to manage your uncontested divorce or family law case is that you will get screwed financially. Your case might be managed extremely well, but you will overbuy unnecessary services and you will overpay for them.

There’s no need for that to occur any longer. Your parents had few other choices on their family law hiring choices. Your grandparents had no other choices. You have many legitimate choices to make your Allentown uncontested divorce attorney hiring decision based upon the nature and truths of your case, not upon the BMW payments of Allentown divorce attorneys. Continue reading.

3. Avoid Unqualified Unregulated Online Divorce Mills:

This is without a doubt the most significant threat you are confronted by in your hiring decision in terms of damage to your future legal and financial safety. Non-lawyer online divorce is a big market. And it is exceptionally harmful to your legal and financial future.

Online divorce mills use slick sites, wicked-cool divorce computer software, charges lower than MOST attorneys, no legal recommendations, no legal knowledge, no professional licensing, no legal education, no code of principles, no malpractice insurance, no knowledge of Lehigh County divorce policies, no local knowledge about Lehigh County guidelines of court, local Lehigh County forms, local practices or the policies of specific local judges in the Allentown area and no expert interest in you or your case. And all within a completely unregulated Wild-West market rampant with all type of incompetence, price fraud, and up-selling.

Online divorce mill charges average about $300, but what you get for that $300 cost is incredibly little– simply prepared Pennsylvania divorce forms. Any other services delivered are all up-sold on the basis that when they’ve got you hooked, what are you going to do – leave cash already invested? You are at their whim and you are entirely unguarded. And they recognize it!

See the Online Divorce Association of America’s website for a very good review of merely a few of the more common scams and up-sells to be experienced in the online divorce market.

If you choose an online divorce mill, you’ll constantly be contending with low-level, untrained, disinterested, high turn-over staff, call center staff members and folks in India, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Mexico or some other state. No one will carry out any kind of analysis on your case to safeguard you and any minor children from future legal or monetary damage. Client support will be awful because it does not have to be anything else. You will never ever have the ability to consult with anybody at an online divorce mill as it is very likely that none of them lie in Allentown or even in Pennsylvania

If you employ an online divorce mill believing you will conserve yourself a few dollars and you and your family wind up paying for their mistakes for years, that is NOT a low-cost divorce!

4. Avoid Me-Too Lawyer Advertising Platforms:

Me-Too Lawyer Advertising Platforms are online lawyer directory sites like Avvo, FindLaw, LegalZoom, Justia, Google Screened, Google Business Profile (formerly GMB) and now even Yelp. This is the most recent mistake to stay away from in your Allentown divorce lawyer hiring choice.

Nevertheless, the prospective damage here is not big– nowhere near the damage done consistently by non-lawyer online divorce mills or undoubtedly the damage most likely to be done by you to your own case with DIY divorce.

If you employ a Allentown divorce lawyer you found on a mass-lawyer finder platform, you’re going to overpay to some extent, depending on how much the lawyer is paying the lawyer finder platform, but not as badly as if you had employed a conventional full representation Allentown family law lawyer straight up.

Obviously, you do not wish to employ a conventional full representation Allentown divorce lawyer you discover on a mass-lawyer platform. That would intensify your over-payment, but the essential element here is that you do not wish to employ a conventional full representation Allentown divorce lawyer to manage your easy uncontested divorce, no matter where you discover that lawyer!!

The risk with hiring a Allentown divorce lawyer that you discover ONLY on a mass-lawyer platform is that you’re employing a run-of-the-mill Allentown divorce lawyer– a drone who simply stands in line with all other Allentown divorce attorneys and HOPES that s/he will get your trade but does nothing to set apart himself or herself from the Allentown lawyer-crowd. That lawyer does nothing to persuade you that s/he is the unique resolution to your case. You do not wish to have that lawyer.

You want to get a Allentown divorce lawyer who is imaginative, bold, one-of-a-kind, classy and business-savvy. In fact, why would you employ a Allentown divorce lawyer to safeguard your own legal and financial interests when s/he does not even take care of his or her own business interests strongly and decisively? You’re looking for a divorce lawyer who intentionally sets himself or herself apart from the Allentown lawyer-crowd and does NOT blend in by joining Avvo and doing nothing else.

Mass-lawyer finder platforms like Avvo are free of cost to join, which is why every divorce lawyer in Lehigh County will have registered. So you must not disqualify a Allentown divorce lawyer only because s/he has an Avvo account.

Nevertheless, you must not presume that such a Allentown divorce lawyer is extremely intelligent or business-savvy either. The problem is that while these mass-lawyer platforms are free of cost for the lawyer to register with, the lawyer needs to then begin to pay constantly increasing charges on a bid-basis, constantly battling versus other local Lehigh County divorce attorneys, to be seen on the top page of the platform’s website. If that lawyer does not pay extra, s/he’ll be on page 3 or 5 of the mass-lawyer website in even a medium-sized town. If that lawyer does not keep bidding up his or her charges, she’ll not get enough trade to stay in business.

It’s a winner-take-all system with the top extremely few attorneys in each town taking almost all cases– based upon how much marketing charges they can pay– not based upon how great they are or on how they have actually configured their offerings to match your case. The barrier to that me-too lawyer getting your case is the quantity of cash s/he is prepared to pay to get it, not the quality and skill of his or her service offerings.

If that me-too divorce lawyer in Allentown pays more to the mass-lawyer finder platform and keeps paying more, s/he’ll get a featured position on the platform’s website and will get more business, but his or her costs of getting cases will constantly increase while his or her charges are reasonably set by the flat need for consumer law services such as divorce.

The Allentown divorce lawyer who plays the Avvo pay-to-play scheme will constantly require a growing number of lower profit cases simply to keep up with sales costs. You do not desire that business-foolishness in someone you will rely on with your legal and financial future.

And yes, that lawyer is going to utilize the very same brain to take care of your case as s/he used to screw his or her own business into the ground.

How to Find the Best Allentown Divorce Lawyer – Allentown Divorce Lawyer | Divorce Attorney Allentown

So above are 4 factors to keep away from: DIY divorce, old-fashioned full-service lawyer representation in easy uncontested cases, unlicensed and unregulated online divorce mills and lackluster me-too drone attorneys who are actually bad at business.

So what do you actually seek in a Allentown divorce lawyer?

Before I tell you, I wish to set the stage by offering you two impressive statistics that I did not presume true when I first saw them. These are game-changers in the legal profession and you really need to maximize them in your Allentown divorce lawyer selection choice:

1. There is a glut of lawyers on the market and it’s serious. According to the ABA National Lawyer Population Survey, in 2017, the whole legal profession lost some 1400 jobs while almost 20,000 brand new lawyers have been added – just in 2017. And the ABA has just certified a huge new law school down in Texas. And this has been trending for years. And all of this surplus of supply while the demand for legal services has been flat or, as in the case of family law, diminishing because of DIY divorce and the overwhelming success of fraudulent and incompetent online divorce mills (both caused by the Internet).
2. From 1988 to 2012, the average solo lawyer practitioner’s yearly income, after adjusting for inflation, dropped from $70,747 to $49,130. Read that last sentence again. This is based on published data from the IRS compiled from solo lawyer practitioner tax returns for the years specified. The legal profession is in serious economic decline. More so in areas of consumer law, like uncontested divorce, where the Internet has reduced the knowledge gap between lawyers and consumers.

What to Look For:

Business-savvy lawyers who want to participate in the divorce industry are under considerable price and business-model pressure right now. Take advantage! You want to hire a Allentown divorce lawyer who has responded to this professional crisis in the following ways.

You want as many of the following factors as you can find in one Allentown divorce attorney:

1. Licensed local Allentown divorce attorney (not an unlicensed out-of-state online divorce mill);
2. Offers unbundled services in uncontested cases– this means that you just purchase the legal services your case requires. You will normally do your own filing of docs at court and arrange for the service of filed docs on your spouse/partner. The divorce lawyer will evaluate your docs before they are submitted to court, determine problem issues in your case and recommend the best choices based upon legal recommendations and local knowledge. If you call a lawyer and ask about unbundled services and you can see that they do not understand or do not desire you to understand, simply hang up. They do not yet get it. Carry on. Do not inform them.
3. Uses online divorce software that allows you to log into a client portal and inputall of the personal data in your case.  This not only saves money and time, but it actually empowers you in your own case. You are the source of all informationin your case. Likewise, there’s no 50-page hard copyone-size-fits-all questionnaire for you to complete in the lawyer’s waiting room.
4. Uses other cloud-based software and apps – listen for buzz phrases like “client portal” and “virtual law practice.” Ask about e-filing and listen closely to determine if the lawyer even knows what it is.
5. Doesn’t have a fancy office in a downtown high-rise or across from the courthouse. You don’t want to pay those rents. This is even more so during C-19. You’re looking for a lawyer in a strip mall or even one who works at home and has one or more shared office arrangements for client meetings. Don’t use a lawyer who has obviously big expenses – YOU pay them!
6. Look for a competitive edge. Look for a lawyer who understands what is going on around him or her in his or her chosen profession. The practice of law is legal education, knowledge and experience attached to a business model. If you call a lawyer and ask about unbundled services or online divorce interviews and they act like law practice is ONLY a noble profession and not a competitive business, hang up. Don’t educate them. They don’t yet get it.
7. Specialization – You don’t want to hire a lawyer who is a jack-of-all-trades on the basis that s/he might get hired for something. There are many different areas of law practice. They are very different from each other. Specialization is the name of the game today. Look at the lawyer’s website. It will tell you whether s/he is trying to get work in numerous areas of practice. It doesn’t matter if the lawyer handles maybe 2 areas of law, particularly if they are both areas of consumer law, such as divorce and bankruptcy. However, if you see that the primary practice area is DUI or personal injury or criminal law and family law appears to be an add-on, move on. Don’t explain.  Just move on. They do not handle enough family law to be any good.  They use family law as an unwanted add-on.  They will not be experienced enough and they will have to charge you a lot because you will be one of very few family law clients. Also, personal injury law paydays are huge and criminal law cases are critical to someone’s personal freedom. Where do you think your family law case will fit into that lawyer’s busy day?
8. Look for a spark – You are looking for a lawyer who has positioned himself or herself in such a way as to convince you that s/he is the unique local divorce lawyer in Allentown that is best suited to resolving your case and your specific problems. This is hard to define, but you will understand if that lawyer makes this connection with you. If there is no such spark on the first exposure, there never will be. Move on.
9. Look for Unique Action – Obviously, this does not involve ONLY standing in line with every other lawyer at Avvo or similar me-too lawyer platforms. Avvo owns all of that attorney’s blog posts and may control his or her entire marketing outreach. Avvo takes money from that lawyer in order to sign up more lawyers in Allentown lawyer-crowd. You’re looking for someone with style who stands out, not melds in. 1-800-DIVORCE is exclusive in Allentown. There is only one 1-800-DIVORCE lawyer in Allentown. Check here or complete the web form below to see if Allentown has a 1-800-DIVORCE.

Divorce and Other Family Law Services Are Available Through 1-800-DIVORCE in Most Medium to Large Cities, Including the Following Cities, As Well As in Allentown:

Philadelphia, Edison, Elizabeth, Newark, Paterson, Jersey City, New York City, Yonkers, Stamford, Baltimore, Bridgeport, New Haven, Waterbury, Washington, D. C., Alexandria, Hartford, Syracuse, Worcester, Providence, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Hampton, Newport News, Lowell, Cambridge, Boston, Erie, Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake