How to Find the Best Divorce Lawyer in Richmond California?  - Richmond Divorce Lawyers - Local Family Law Firms in Richmond

It’s a trick question. You don’t need to find the best divorce attorney in Richmond, California There are plenty of divorce attorneys in Richmond that would likely do an every bit as excellent undertaking for you. It would definitely be impracticable to figure which one is the “best.”

The legitimate concern for you, the Richmond divorce buyer, is exactly how to find one of those Richmond top-notch divorce attorneys at the appropriate levels of representation as well as price for the realities of your unique circumstances – while avoiding all of the common, as well as in some cases hazardous, risks of the Richmond divorce attorney hiring choice.

If you understand what those risks are (I will certainly inform you in this article) as well as if you have the appropriate mindset, particularly that you want to make your Richmond divorce attorney fit your instance as well as not permit the lawyer to compel your instance to fit his/her rigid practice profile, after that you boost greatly your opportunities of nailing the Richmond divorce attorney employing choice. Getting you through that decision successfully is the purpose of this post.

First, let’s note the 4 aspects to avoid:

1. Avoid Do-It-Yourself Divorce:

It is conceivable, repeat POSSIBLE, to acquire cost-free family law documents from California’s judicial council or family court sites. Those cost-free divorce documents will be blank, obviously. You can then try to complete as well as record the documents at your local Contra Costa County divorce court by yourself without professional help. This is possible – nevertheless extremely improbable, very challenging, confusing, frustrating as well as very time-consuming.

Do it yourself divorce would be essentially unfeasible, as well as not wise even to try, in any  complicated or contested family law case. It would be extremely improbable to be effective if you have minor children of the marriage or have any assets or debts to be detailed in the event or have custody, visitation or assistance settlements in your case. It would definitely be unwise in a matter involving domestic violence. Do it yourself would also be tough if you work or if you put any kind of worth on your own time. Family law documents as well as procedures are designed by attorneys to puzzle you to make sure that you work with – a lawyer.

Please excuse me if I don’t spend too much time on the do it yourself danger. My experience on the cutting edge of California divorce for the past 40+ years is that individuals that start the divorce process with the intent to try to obtain a free divorce are going to  try Do-It-Yourself divorce whatever. Somehow, most likely economic, there is nothing I have actually had the ability to discover to convince them not to.

DIY in Family Law is consistently false economy. You WILL probably screw it up, as well as screwed-up matters are far more troublesome as well as really expensive to correct as well as complete. Don’t play this game. The system is designed by attorneys to puzzle you as well as compel you to employ a divorce attorney. There are now cost-effective choices offered– see below. Don’t go it alone in Divorce or Family Law.

2. Avoid Traditional Richmond 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 don’t need to be pleased as well as they don’t need to care for each other. They are either entirely or mostly in agreement on all issues as well as are wise enough to recognize that traditional full-representation divorce attorneys (with huge retainers as well as billable hours) would be the only victors if they contested relatively insignificant issues in their divorce.

Traditional complete representation by a regional Richmond divorce attorney is when that attorney will represent you in all parts of your divorce litigation. It is extremely likely to be a good professional service, yet it is high priced.

If you have a disputed matter, a complex matter, a high-value matter or a matter that includes domestic violence or the threat of domestic violence, complete representation by a Richmond divorce attorney is NOT to be avoided. It is a prerequisite.

A disputed matter indicates that you as well as your spouse/partner are disputing ANY issue in the matter. A complicated matter has legal complexities such as tax issues, current business issues, a special needs child of the marriage or any one of countless other complicated legal issues. A high-value case indicates that your marital estate is very large. There is no specific dollar limit. Absolutely, if you have a high 7-figure net marital estate or higher, that is a high-value matter.

If you believe that you have a disputed,complex or high-value matter, you do. Hire an experienced as well as expensive Richmond divorce attorney for complete traditional representation. Search for a certified Family Law specialist. You will certainly not be sorry you did.

If you do NOT have a disputed, complex, high-value or domestic violence case, you do NOT need traditional complete representation by a Richmond divorce attorney. In fact, under those conditions, complete legal representation by a Richmond divorce attorney becomes a risk to your economic position. Avoid it.

Of course, if you call or email a traditional Richmond divorce attorney, they will not tell you that you do not need their complete representation service. In fact, they will try to terrify the crap out of you by sharing with you that you positively need to have their service which your case will get messed up without it.

That could well occur– even in a non-DIY case. I’ll share with you next how to keep away from potentially 90+% of the potential danger of getting your case messed up if you don’t go DIY and you DON’T employ a traditional Richmond divorce lawyer on a full representation basis.

Your case could also potentially get messed up if you DID employ a full representation Richmond divorce lawyer. That’s also not probable, however it could possibly occur.

However, what will DEFINITELY occur if you employ a traditional complete representation Richmond divorce lawyer to handle your uncontested divorce or family law case is that you will get screwed financially. Your case may be handled very well, however you will overbuy unnecessary services and you will pay too much for them.

There’s no need for that to occur any longer. Your mothers and fathers had few other choices on their family law employing choices. Your grandparents had no other choices. You have numerous valid choices to make your Richmond uncontested divorce attorney employing decision based upon the nature and facts of your case, not upon the BMW payments of Richmond divorce attorneys. Read on.

3. Avoid Unqualified Unregulated Online Divorce Mills:

This is by far the most significant threat you deal with in your employing decision in regards to damage to your future legal and economic security. Non-lawyer online divorce is a substantial industry. And it is very hazardous to your legal and economic future.

Online divorce mills provide slick sites, wicked-cool divorce software applications, charges lower than MOST attorneys, no legal recommendations, no legal understanding, no professional licensing, no legal education, no code of ethics, no malpractice insurance, no understanding of Contra Costa County divorce procedures, no regional understanding about Contra Costa County guidelines of court, regional Contra Costa County documents, regional practices or the policies of individual regional judges in the Richmond region and no professional interest in you or your case. And all within an entirely unregulated Wild-West industry widespread with all kinds of incompetence, price scams, and up-selling.

Online divorce mill charges average about $300, however what you get for that $300 charge is incredibly little– simply prepared California divorce documents. 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 money already invested? You are at their whim and you are entirely unguarded. And they know it!

See the Online Divorce Association of America’s website for a great analysis of merely some of the more typical scams and up-sells to be found in the online divorce industry.

If you choose an online divorce mill, you’ll always be contending with low-level, untrained, indifferent, high turn-over staff, call center workers 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 protect you and any minor children from future legal or financial damage. Client assistance will be terrible since it does not need to be anything else. You will never have the ability to consult with anybody at an online divorce mill as it is most likely that none are located in Richmond or even in California

If you work with an online divorce mill thinking you will save yourself a few dollars and you and your family end up paying for their errors 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 newest risk to avoid in your Richmond divorce lawyer employing choice.

However, the potential harm here is not huge– nowhere near the damage done regularly 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 work with a Richmond divorce lawyer you found on a mass-lawyer finder platform, you’re going to pay too much to some extent, depending on just how much the lawyer is paying the lawyer finder platform, however not as terribly as if you had employed a traditional complete representation Richmond family law lawyer directly.

Certainly, you don’t want to employ a traditional complete representation Richmond divorce lawyer you find on a mass-lawyer platform. That would intensify your over-payment, however the essential aspect here is that you don’t want to employ a traditional complete representation Richmond divorce lawyer to handle your basic uncontested divorce, no matter where you find that lawyer!!

The danger with employing a Richmond divorce lawyer that you find ONLY on a mass-lawyer platform is that you’re hiring an uninspired Richmond divorce lawyer– a drone who simply stands in line with all other Richmond divorce attorneys and HOPES that s/he will get your business however does nothing to differentiate himself or herself from the Richmond lawyer-crowd. That lawyer does nothing to convince you that s/he is the one-of-a-kind resolution to your case. You don’t want to have that lawyer.

You would like a Richmond divorce lawyer who is creative, bold, unique, stylish and business-savvy. In fact, why would you work with a Richmond divorce lawyer to take care of your own legal and economic interests when s/he does not even care for his/her own business interests aggressively and decisively? You’re trying to find a divorce lawyer who intentionally sets himself or herself apart from the Richmond lawyer-crowd and does NOT blend in by joining Avvo and doing nothing else.

Mass-lawyer finder platforms like Avvo are completely free to join, which is why every divorce lawyer in Contra Costa County will have joined. So you should not disqualify a Richmond divorce lawyer only because s/he has an Avvo account.

However, you should not assume that such a Richmond divorce lawyer is very smart or business-savvy either. The issue is that while these mass-lawyer platforms are completely free for the lawyer to register with, the lawyer will need to then start to pay continually increasing charges on a bid-basis, always competing versus other regional Contra Costa County divorce attorneys, to be seen on the top page of the platform’s website. If that lawyer does not pay more, 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/her charges, she’ll not get sufficient business to keep up.

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

If that me-too divorce lawyer in Richmond pays more to the mass-lawyer finder company and keeps paying more, s/he’ll get a highlighted position on the platform’s website and will get more sales, however his/her costs of acquiring cases will constantly rise while his/her charges are relatively fixed by the flat demand for consumer law services such as divorce.

The Richmond divorce lawyer who plays the Avvo pay-to-play scheme will always need more and more lower revenue cases simply to keep up with sales costs. You don’t want that business-foolishness in someone you will rely on with your legal and economic future.

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

How to Find the Best Richmond Divorce Lawyer – Richmond Divorce Lawyers - Local Family Law Firms in Richmond

So above are 4 concerns to stay away from: do it yourself divorce, conventional full-service lawyer representation in basic uncontested cases, unlicensed and unregulated online divorce mills and lackluster me-too drone attorneys who are really bad at law practice business.

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

Before I inform you, I want to set the stage by providing you two impressive stats that I did not accept when I first saw them. These are game-changers in the legal profession and you need to take full advantage of them in your Richmond divorce lawyer employing 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 Richmond 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 Richmond divorce attorney:

1. Licensed local Richmond divorce attorney (not an unlicensed out-of-state online divorce mill);
2. Offers unbundled services in uncontested cases– this denotes that you just buy the legal services your case actually 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 review your docs before they are submitted to court, determine problem concerns in your case and suggest the very best choices based upon legal recommendations and regional understanding. If you call a lawyer and ask about unbundled services and you can determine they don’t know or don’t want you to know, simply hang up. They don’t yet get it. Carry on. Don’t inform them.
3. Uses online divorce software that enables you to log into a client portal and enterall of the data 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 informationin your case. Likewise, there’s no 50-page paper copyone-size-fits-all questionnaire for you to get through 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 Richmond 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 Richmond lawyer-crowd. You’re looking for someone with style who stands out, not melds in. 1-800-DIVORCE is exclusive in Richmond. There is only one 1-800-DIVORCE lawyer in Richmond. Check here or complete the web form below to see if Richmond 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 Richmond:

Oakland, San Francisco, Vallejo, Daly City, Concord, Hayward, San Mateo, Fairfield, Antioch, Santa Rosa, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, San Jose, Stockton, Elk Grove, Sacramento, Modesto, Roseville, Salinas, Fresno, Clovis, Reno, Visalia, Santa Maria, Bakersfield, Ventura, Oxnard, Simi Valley, Lancaster, Santa Clarita