How to Find the Best Divorce Lawyer in Vallejo California?  - Vallejo Divorce Lawyer | Vallejo Family Law Attorney

It’s a trick question. You do not need to find the absolute best divorce attorney in Vallejo, California There are plenty of divorce attorneys in Vallejo that will do an every bit as excellent effort for you. It would undoubtedly be impracticable to establish which one is the “absolute best.”

The correct issue for you, the Vallejo divorce buyer, is just how to discover just one of those Vallejo top-notch divorce attorneys at the right standards of representation and price for the realities of your particular scenario – while staying clear of all of the usual, and occasionally harmful, pitfalls of the Vallejo divorce lawyer selection decision.

If you recognize what those pitfalls are (I will tell you in this blog post) and if you have the correct mindset, namely that you want to make your Vallejo divorce lawyer fit your instance and not enable the lawyer to require your instance to fit his or her inflexible practice profile, after that you raise considerably your possibilities of nailing the Vallejo divorce lawyer hiring decision. Getting you through that decision efficiently is the purpose of this blog post.

To begin with, let’s list the 4 factors to stay clear of:

1. Avoid Do-It-Yourself Divorce:

It is conceivable, repeat POSSIBLE, to download totally free family law forms from California’s judicial council or family court sites. Those totally free divorce forms are going to be uncompleted, obviously. You can at that point attempt to finish and file the forms at your local Solano County divorce court by yourself without specialist help. This is possible – but extremely unlikely, really difficult, confusing, frustrating and extremely time-consuming.

DIY divorce would certainly be practically unachievable, and not smart even to try, in any  complicated or contended family law matter. It would certainly be extremely unlikely to be a success if you have minor children of the marital relationship or have any assets or financial obligations to be itemized in the event or have custody, visitation or support arrangements in your matter. It would definitely be risky in a matter entailing domestic physical violence. DIY would certainly also be difficult if you have a job or if you put any sort of value on your own time. Family law forms and processeses are developed by attorneys to perplex you to ensure that you hire – an attorney.

Please excuse me if I do not spend way too much time on the DIY danger. My experience on the front lines of California divorce for the past 40+ years is that folks that begin the divorce process with the intent to attempt to obtain a free divorce are going to  attempt Do-It-Yourself divorce regardless of what. For one reason or another, most likely economic, there is nothing I‘ve been able to uncover to persuade them not to.

Do It Yourself in Family Law is always false affordability. You WILL probably screw it up, and screwed-up matters are much more troublesome and really expensive to remedy and conclude. Do not play this game. The system is developed by attorneys to perplex you and require you to employ a divorce lawyer. There are now economical options readily available– see below. Do not go it alone in Divorce or Family Law.

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

An uncontested divorce is merely one in which the participants will not be contesting any issues, including the divorce itself. The participants do not have to be pleased and they do not have to care for each other. They are either totally or mostly in agreement on all issues and are smart enough to understand that standard full-representation divorce attorneys (with big retainers and billable hrs) would certainly be the only victors if they contended relatively inconsequential issues in their divorce.

Traditional full representation by a regional Vallejo divorce lawyer is when that lawyer will represent you in all facets of your divorce litigation. It is extremely likely to be an excellent professional service, yet it is very expensive.

If you have a contested case, a complicated case, a high-value case or a matter that entails domestic violence or the threat of domestic violence, full representation by a Vallejo divorce lawyer is NOT to be avoided. It is a necessity.

A contested case indicates that you and your spouse/partner are contesting ANY issue in the case. A complicated case contains legal complexities such as tax issues, current business issues, a special needs child of the marital relationship or any one of countless additional intricate legal scenarios. A high-value case denotes that your marital estate is very large. There is no particular dollar limit. Absolutely, if you have a high 7-figure net marital estate or greater, that is a high-value case.

If you suspect that you have a contested,complicated or high-value case, you do. Employ an expert and expensive Vallejo divorce lawyer for full conventional representation. Search for a certified Family Law specialist. You will not be sorry you did.

If you do NOT have a contested, complex, high-value or domestic violence case, you do NOT need conventional full representation by a Vallejo divorce lawyer. In fact, under those circumstances, full legal representation by a Vallejo divorce lawyer ends up being a danger to your economic position. Stay clear of it.

Obviously, if you call or email a traditional Vallejo divorce lawyer, they will not tell you that you do not need their full representation service. In fact, they will attempt to terrify the crap out of you by telling you that you positively require their service and that your case will get messed up without it.

That could occur– even in a non-DIY case. I’ll share with you next how to prevent perhaps 90+% of the possible danger of getting your case messed up if you do not go DIY and you DON’T employ a traditional Vallejo divorce lawyer on a complete representation basis.

Your case might likewise perhaps get messed up if you DID employ a complete representation Vallejo divorce lawyer. That’s likewise not likely, but it could occur.

However, what will DEFINITELY occur if you employ a traditional full representation Vallejo divorce lawyer to manage your uncontested divorce or family law case is that you will get screwed financially. Your case might be handled very well, but you will overbuy excessive services and you will overpay for them.

There’s no requirement for that to occur any longer. Your parents had few other options on their family law hiring options. Your grandparents had no other options. You have many legitimate options to make your Vallejo uncontested divorce lawyer hiring decision based upon the nature and facts of your case, not upon the BMW payments of Vallejo divorce attorneys. Keep reading.

3. Avoid Unqualified Unregulated Online Divorce Mills:

This is without a doubt the biggest risk you deal with in your hiring decision in regards to damage to your future legal and economic security. Non-lawyer online divorce is a big market. And it is extremely harmful to your legal and economic future.

Online divorce mills offer slick websites, wicked-cool divorce software applications, costs lower than MOST attorneys, no legal advice, no legal knowledge, no professional licensing, no legal education, no code of principles, no malpractice insurance coverage, no knowledge of Solano County divorce policies, no local knowledge about Solano County rules of court, local Solano County forms, local practices or the policies of individual local judges in the Vallejo region and no expert interest in you or your case. And all within an entirely unregulated Wild-West market rampant with all kinds of incompetence, price fraud, and up-selling.

Online divorce mill costs average about $300, but what you get for that $300 charge is remarkably little– simply prepared California divorce forms. Any other services provided are all up-sold on the basis that once they’ve got you hooked, what are you going to do – leave money already invested? You are at their mercy and you are totally vulnerable. And they recognize it!

See the Online Divorce Association of America’s site for a great overview of just some of the more typical frauds and up-sells to be discovered in the online divorce market.

If you employ an online divorce mill, you’ll always be contending with low-level, untrained, indifferent, 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 kind of analysis on your case to protect you and any minor children from future legal or financial damage. Customer support will be terrible since it does not have to be anything else. You will never be able to consult with anyone at an online divorce mill as it is likely that none are located in Vallejo or perhaps in California

If you hire an online divorce mill believing you will save yourself a few dollars and you and your household wind up spending for their errors for several years, that is NOT a low-cost divorce!

4. Avoid Me-Too Lawyer Advertising Platforms:

Me-Too Lawyer Advertising Platforms are online lawyer directories like Avvo, FindLaw, LegalZoom, Justia, Google Screened, Google Business Profile (formerly GMB) and now even Yelp. This is the newest pitfall to stay clear of in your Vallejo divorce lawyer hiring decision.

However, the possible damage here is not big– nowhere near the damage done consistently 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 Vallejo divorce lawyer you found on a mass-lawyer finder platform, you’re going to overpay to some extent, depending upon just how much the lawyer is paying the lawyer finder platform, but not as severely as if you had hired a traditional full representation Vallejo family law lawyer directly.

Certainly, you do not wish to employ a traditional full representation Vallejo divorce lawyer you find on a mass-lawyer platform. That would intensify your over-payment, but the essential factor here is that you do not wish to employ a traditional full representation Vallejo divorce lawyer to manage your simple uncontested divorce, no matter where you find that lawyer!!

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

You want a Vallejo divorce lawyer who is creative, bold, unique, classy and business-savvy. In fact, why would you hire a Vallejo divorce lawyer to oversee your own legal and economic interests when s/he does not even care for his or her own law practice interests strongly and decisively? You’re searching for a divorce lawyer who purposefully sets himself or herself apart from the Vallejo lawyer-crowd and does NOT blend in by signing up with Avvo and not doing anything else.

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

However, you ought to not assume that such a Vallejo divorce lawyer is really intelligent or business-savvy either. The issue is that while these mass-lawyer platforms are totally free for the lawyer to sign up, the lawyer needs to then begin to pay constantly increasing costs on a bid-basis, always battling against other local Solano County divorce attorneys, to be seen on the top page of the platform’s site. If that lawyer does not pay more, s/he’ll be on page 3 or 5 of the mass-lawyer site in even a medium-sized town. If that lawyer does not keep bidding up his or her costs, she’ll not get adequate trade to keep up.

It’s a winner-take-all system with the top really few attorneys in each town taking almost all clients– based upon just how much advertising costs they can pay– not based upon how excellent they are or on how they have actually configured their offerings to fit 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 distinctiveness of his or her service offerings.

If that me-too divorce lawyer in Vallejo pays more to the mass-lawyer finder company and keeps paying more, s/he’ll get a highlighted position on the platform’s site and will get more sales, but his or her expenses of working will continuously rise while his or her costs are relatively fixed by the flat demand for consumer law services such as divorce.

The Vallejo divorce lawyer who plays the Avvo pay-to-play scheme will always need more and more lower profit cases simply to keep up with business expenses. You do not desire that business-foolishness in someone you will trust 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 or her own law practice into the ground.

How to Find the Best Vallejo Divorce Lawyer – Vallejo Divorce Lawyer | Vallejo Family Law Attorney

So above are 4 things to refrain from using: DIY divorce, old-fashioned full-service lawyer representation in simple uncontested cases, unlicensed and unregulated online divorce mills and boring me-too drone attorneys who are actually bad at business.

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

Before I tell you, I wish to set the stage by offering you two amazing stats that I did not presume true when I initially saw them. These are game-changers in the legal profession and you need to take full advantage of them in your Vallejo 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 Vallejo 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 Vallejo divorce attorney:

1. Licensed local Vallejo 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 usually do your own filing of docs at court and schedule the service of filed docs on your spouse/partner. The divorce lawyer will examine your docs before they are filed, determine problem issues in your case and suggest the best options based upon legal advice and local knowledge. If you call a lawyer and ask about unbundled services and you can determine they do not know or do not desire you to know, simply hang up. They do not yet get it. Move on. Do not educate 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 saves money and time, but it in fact 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 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 Vallejo 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 Vallejo lawyer-crowd. You’re looking for someone with style who stands out, not melds in. 1-800-DIVORCE is exclusive in Vallejo. There is only one 1-800-DIVORCE lawyer in Vallejo. Check here or complete the web form below to see if Vallejo 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 Vallejo:

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