How to Find the Best Divorce Lawyer in Lansing Michigan?  - Lansing DIvorce Lawyer | Michigan Family Law Attorney

It’s a trick question. You don’t want to identify the most effective divorce lawyer in Lansing, Michigan There are many divorce attorneys in Lansing who will do an every bit as very good effort for you. It would definitely be out of the question to establish which one is the “best.”

The actual issue for you, the Lansing divorce consumer, is just how to locate just one of those Lansing top divorce lawyers at the precise levels of representation and also price for the aspects of your certain circumstances – while staying clear of every one of the typical, and also often dangerous, challenges of the Lansing divorce attorney selection decision.

If you know what those challenges are (I will certainly advise you in this blog post) and also if you have the appropriate attitude, specifically that you wish to make your Lansing divorce attorney fit your case and also not allow the lawyer to force your case to fit his/her rigid practice profile, then you increase greatly your possibilities of nailing the Lansing divorce attorney employing decision. Getting you through that selection efficiently is the objective of this post.

Initially, let’s itemize the 4 factors to stay away from:

1. Avoid Do-It-Yourself Divorce:

It is entirely possible, repeat POSSIBLE, to download totally free family law forms from Michigan’s judicial council or family court internet sites. Those totally free divorce forms will be blank, of course. You can at that point try to finish and also submit the forms at your local Ingham County divorce court by yourself without expert help. This is possible – however highly improbable, extremely challenging, complex, irritating and also incredibly slow.

Do it yourself divorce would certainly be essentially unfeasible, and also not sensible even to try, in any kind of  complex or contested family law case. It would certainly be highly improbable to be a success if you have minor children of the marital relationship or have any kind of assets or debts to be detailed in case or have custody, visitation or assistance arrangements in your proceedings. It would absolutely be unwise in a case involving domestic violence. Do it yourself would certainly likewise be hard if you work or if you put any sort of worth on your own time. Family law forms and also procedures are made by lawyers to perplex you so that you hire – a lawyer.

Please excuse me if I don’t spend excessive time on the do it yourself threat. My experience on the cutting edge of California divorce for the past 40+ years is that folks who start the divorce process with the intent to try to get a free divorce are going to  try Do-It-Yourself divorce whatever. For some reason, most likely financial, there is absolutely nothing I‘ve been able to uncover to persuade them not to.

Do It Yourself in Family Law is always fake economy. You WILL probably screw it up, and also screwed-up cases are much more difficult and also very expensive to correct and also conclude. Do not play this game. The system is made by lawyers to perplex you and also force you to employ a divorce attorney. There are currently cost-effective choices readily available– see below. Do not go it alone in Divorce or Family Law.

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

An uncontested divorce is just one in which the litigants will not be challenging any kind of problems, including the divorce itself. The litigants don’t have to be happy and also they don’t have to like each other. They are either totally or generally in agreement on all problems and also are sensible enough to recognize that standard full-representation divorce lawyers (with huge retainers and also billable hours) would certainly be the only victors if they contested reasonably insignificant problems in their divorce.

Traditional complete representation by a regional Lansing divorce attorney is when that attorney will represent you in all facets of your divorce litigation. It is highly likely to be an excellent professional service, but it is very costly.

If you have a contested matter, a complicated matter, a high-value matter or a case that involves domestic violence or the threat of domestic violence, complete representation by a Lansing divorce attorney is NOT to be evaded. It is a prerequisite.

A contested matter indicates that you and also your spouse/partner are contesting ANY issue in the matter. A complex matter contains legal intricacies such as tax problems, current business problems, a special needs child of the marital relationship or any one of numerous other complex legal situations. A high-value case denotes that your marital estate is huge. There is no particular dollar limit. Definitely, if you have a high 7-figure net marital estate or higher, that is a high-value matter.

If you suspect that you have a contested,complicated or high-value matter, you do. Employ an experienced and also expensive Lansing divorce attorney for complete conventional representation. Search for a certified Family Law specialist. You will certainly not be sorry you did.

If you do NOT have a contested, complex, high-value or domestic violence case, you do NOT require conventional complete representation by a Lansing divorce attorney. In fact, under those conditions, complete legal representation by a Lansing divorce attorney becomes a risk to your financial position. Stay clear of it.

Obviously, if you call or email a traditional Lansing divorce attorney, they will not tell you that you do not require their complete representation service. In fact, they will try to terrify the crap out of you by telling you that you undeniably need to have their service and that your case will get screwed up without it.

That might come to pass– even in a non-DIY case. I’ll share with you next how to stay clear of perhaps 90+% of the prospective threat of getting your case screwed up if you don’t go DIY and you DON’T employ a traditional Lansing divorce lawyer on a complete representation basis.

Your case could also perhaps get screwed up if you DID employ a complete representation Lansing divorce lawyer. That’s also not likely, but it could take place.

Nevertheless, what will DEFINITELY take place if you employ a traditional complete representation Lansing divorce lawyer to manage your uncontested divorce or family law case is that you will get screwed economically. Your case might be handled very well, but you will overbuy excessive services and you will pay too much for them.

There’s no requirement for that to take place anymore. Your mothers and fathers had few other choices on their family law employing decisions. Your grandparents had no other choices. You have many legitimate choices to make your Lansing uncontested divorce attorney employing selection based upon the nature and truths of your case, not upon the BMW payments of Lansing divorce lawyers. Keep reading.

3. Avoid Unqualified Unregulated Online Divorce Mills:

This is by far the most significant danger you face in your employing selection in regards to damage to your future legal and financial security. Non-lawyer online divorce is a huge market. And it is incredibly dangerous to your legal and financial future.

Online divorce mills offer slick websites, wicked-cool divorce software applications, costs lower than MOST lawyers, no legal suggestions, no legal understanding, no professional licensing, no legal education, no code of ethics, no malpractice insurance coverage, no understanding of Ingham County divorce policies, no regional understanding about Ingham County rules of court, regional Ingham County forms, regional practices or the policies of specific regional judges in the Lansing area and no expert interest in you or your case. And all within a completely unregulated Wild-West market widespread with all sort of incompetence, price fraud, and up-selling.

Online divorce mill costs average about $300, but what you get for that $300 cost is incredibly little– simply prepared Michigan divorce forms. Any other services supplied are all up-sold on the basis that when they’ve got you hooked, what are you going to do – walk away from cash already invested? You are at their mercy and you are totally vulnerable. And they recognize it!

See the Online Divorce Association of America’s website for a good overview of just some of the more common scams and up-sells to be found in the online divorce market.

If you hire an online divorce mill, you’ll constantly be dealing with low-level, inexperienced, disinterested, high turn-over personnel, call center staff members and folks in India, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Mexico or some other state. No one will perform any type of analysis on your case to secure you and any minor children from future legal or financial damage. Customer assistance will be horrible because it doesn’t have to be anything else. You will never ever have the ability to meet anyone at an online divorce mill as it is most likely that none lie in Lansing or even in Michigan

If you hire an online divorce mill believing you will conserve yourself a few dollars and you and your household end up spending for their mistakes for many years, that is NOT a cheap 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 newest risk to stay away from in your Lansing divorce lawyer employing decision.

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

If you hire a Lansing divorce lawyer you found on a mass-lawyer finder platform, you’re going to pay too much to some extent, depending upon how much the lawyer is paying the lawyer finder platform, but not as terribly as if you had actually hired a traditional complete representation Lansing family law lawyer directly.

Certainly, you don’t wish to employ a traditional complete representation Lansing divorce lawyer you find on a mass-lawyer platform. That would compound your over-payment, but the essential factor here is that you don’t wish to employ a traditional complete representation Lansing divorce lawyer to manage your easy uncontested divorce, no matter where you find that lawyer!!

The threat with employing a Lansing divorce lawyer that you find ONLY on a mass-lawyer platform is that you’re hiring a humdrum Lansing divorce lawyer– a drone who simply stands in line with all other Lansing divorce lawyers and HOPES that s/he will get your business but does nothing to set apart himself or herself from the Lansing lawyer-crowd. That lawyer does nothing to influence you that s/he is the best solution to your case. You don’t want to have that lawyer.

You would like a Lansing divorce lawyer who is innovative, vibrant, one-of-a-kind, stylish and business-savvy. In fact, why would you hire a Lansing divorce lawyer to safeguard your own legal and financial interests when s/he does not even care for his/her own business interests strongly and decisively? You’re trying to find a divorce lawyer who purposefully sets himself or herself apart from the Lansing lawyer-crowd and does NOT blend in by signing up with Avvo and not doing anything else.

Mass-lawyer finder platforms like Avvo are completely free to sign up with, which is why every divorce lawyer in Ingham County will have registered. So you need to not disqualify a Lansing divorce lawyer only because s/he has an Avvo account.

Nevertheless, you need to not expect that such a Lansing divorce lawyer is extremely good or business-savvy either. The problem is that while these mass-lawyer platforms are completely free for the lawyer to join, the lawyer will need to then start to pay continually increasing costs on a bid-basis, constantly competing versus other regional Ingham County divorce lawyers, to be seen on the leading page of the platform’s website. If that lawyer doesn’t 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 doesn’t keep bidding up his/her costs, she’ll not get enough business to stay in business.

It’s a winner-take-all system with the leading extremely few lawyers in each town taking almost all clients– based on how much marketing costs they can pay– not based on how good they are or on how they have configured their offerings to fit your case. The barrier to that me-too lawyer getting your business is the quantity of cash s/he is prepared to pay to get it, not the quality and distinctiveness of his/her service offerings.

If that me-too divorce lawyer in Lansing pays more to the mass-lawyer finder company and keeps paying more, s/he’ll get a featured position on the platform’s website and will get more clients, but his/her costs of working will constantly rise while his/her costs are reasonably fixed by the flat demand for consumer law services such as divorce.

The Lansing divorce lawyer who plays the Avvo pay-to-play scheme will constantly require increasingly more lower revenue cases simply to stay on top of business costs. You don’t want that business-foolishness in somebody you will rely on with your legal and financial future.

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

How to Find the Best Lansing Divorce Lawyer – Lansing DIvorce Lawyer | Michigan Family Law Attorney

So above are 4 factors to keep clear of: do it yourself divorce, conventional full-service lawyer representation in easy uncontested cases, unlicensed and unregulated online divorce mills and uninspiring me-too drone lawyers who are truly bad at the business of law practice.

So what do you actually try to find in a Lansing divorce lawyer?

Before I advise you, I wish to set the stage by providing you two impressive stats that I did not presume true when I initially saw them. These are game-changers in the legal profession and you really need to take full advantage of them in your Lansing divorce lawyer employing decision:

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 Lansing 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 Lansing divorce attorney:

1. Licensed local Lansing divorce attorney (not an unlicensed out-of-state online divorce mill);
2. Offers unbundled services in uncontested cases– this indicates that you only buy the legal services your case actually requires. You will typically do your own filing of docs at court and schedule the service of filed docs on your spouse/partner. The divorce lawyer will review your docs before they are submitted to court, determine problem issues in your case and suggest the best choices based upon legal suggestions and regional understanding. If you call a lawyer and ask about unbundled services and you can see that they don’t understand or don’t want you to understand, simply hang up. They don’t yet get it. Carry on. Do not inform them.
3. Uses online divorce software that allows you to log into a client portal and enterall of the details in your case.  This not only conserves money and time, but it literally empowers you in your own case. You are the source of all datain your case. Also, there’s no 50-page hard copyone-size-fits-all questionnaire for you to complete in the lawyer’s waiting area.
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 Lansing 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 Lansing lawyer-crowd. You’re looking for someone with style who stands out, not melds in. 1-800-DIVORCE is exclusive in Lansing. There is only one 1-800-DIVORCE lawyer in Lansing. Check here or complete the web form below to see if Lansing has a 1-800-DIVORCE.

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