Five Tips for Hiring a Family Attorney

You and your spouse have been having issues for a while. One day it comes to a head and you both decide it would be for the best to get a divorce. Family matters like this can be sensitive. That’s why you need a family attorney who can work with you during this difficult time. Not make things harder.

There are a wide variety of family-related law issues. It’s important that you find an attorney who can handle your specific situation. To help you pick the best attorney for you, check out the following search tips.

Look for Referrals

The first thing that you should do is ask your family and friends if they have either been in the same situation as you or know someone who has. They can tell you what attorney that they went through to resolve their case. If you've had to go through a law office for something completely different in the past they will be knowledgeable about other offices in the area. They may be able to give you a few referrals.

Do a Background Check

Once you have a few names that you can work with you'll want to do a thorough background check on them. You'll be giving them a lot of confidential family information after all. If you can, try to get some information about their past cases to get a feel for their methods. This will be a good reflection for how they will handle your case.

Check for Professional Experience

Make sure they have the proper certifications to take on your case. After you've determined that, it's only a matter of finding out how many cases like yours that they've won. Make sure you look or ask for specific numbers. Find out how many years that a particular practice has been around before you hire them. You can sometimes find this information on their website or by calling and asking directly.

Determine Charges and Rates

Some attorney's rates can get expensive even for small family matters. It's up to you to decide if the attorney's experience and services match up to the cost. Make sure that the expense is in your budget at all. If it is then get a full list of the attorney's services and the charge for each service.

Don't Be Afraid to Ask Questions

Do not be afraid to ask questions. You're giving someone a lot of money to perform a service so you should be treating it like a job interview in a way. Here are some of the basic questions that you should be asking when you call.

• Do You Handle Family Issues Regularly? – Ask this question in the event that your situation is rare. While the attorney may not have seen a situation like yours before if they've handled a bunch of different family cases, they may know enough where they can figure things out.
• For What do You Charge? – If you can get a complete walk through of what you're being charged you can determine if their services are worth the money. Their charges may include long distance telephone calls, postage, research fees, mileage, and time spent in general. These may be all little charges for the most part but they will add up quickly.
• Do You Provide a Detailed Bill or a General Bill? – This can be important for budgeting purposes because you'll know exactly where your money is going.
• Who Will be Working with Me? – Larger practices will have several attorneys that handle cases. It's important that you ask the person on the phone if you will be working with them or someone else. You need to find out who you will need to contact specifically. Sometimes, if your case is more complicated then others, you work with a team of individuals. If they feel the need to put a private investigator on it, you may work with them too. Make sure you get names and find out how experienced they are.
• How Does Someone Contact You? –In order to get the best response time, it's best to know how you can contact your attorney. Ask what the attorneys preferred form of communication is. Some prefer emails and some prefer phone. Sometimes they prefer both but their response time is much faster depending on their case load.
• How Do You Handle Issues When They Arise? – As much as you would like for your case to go as smoothly as possible, there is always some sort of issue. You want to ask this question because if the attorney can't give you you the bad news then that should raise some flags. They need to be able to tell you any potential problems and how they plan to try and work around them.

Hire the Best Family Attorney for Your Case

Are you about to go through some type of divorce? Want to get custody of your children? No matter what your situation is, you're going to need the best family attorney to help you solve it. As long as you know what to be looking out for and what questions you should ask, you should be able to find one to suit your needs. Don't let just anyone take your case. Take the time to do thorough research and work with an attorney you feel that you can truly trust.