After a serious injury, victims may feel like they could benefit from having a lawyer on their side. However, they are far too often intimidated by the prospect of having to pay a lawyer. On TV, lawyers drive fancy cars and work in glittering offices. All that money has to come from somewhere, right?
In this article, we'll try to answer the following questions:
- How expensive are personal injury lawyers?
- Can I afford a lawyer after an accident?
- What do good injury lawyers cost?
- How do contingency fee agreements work?
We can't speak for other firms. But here's how we provide you excellent legal service with no out-of-pocket financial risk to you.
We don't charge you money for fees unless we recover money for you. And then, it's only a percentage out of your winnings.
Traditional law firms charge their clients up front. First, you'll be required to put a "retainer" down, which is essentially a down payment. After that, your attorney bills you "by the hour" at a rate you both agree on in advance. That means that no matter what work they do on your case---answer the phone from an opposing counsel, draft up filings, speak with you in person, travel to court---they charge you the same flat rate per hour. Most competent attorneys charge hundreds of dollars per hour.
And we can promise you this: being a good lawyer takes a lot of time. Your attorney needs to properly investigate your claim, research the law, draft up pleadings, travel to and from hearings and depositions, and a thousand other tasks. Bottom line---it adds up.
What's more, your attorney could bill you even hundreds of thousands of dollars, and not win. Think about that! You've shelled out all that money and are left with nothing.
That's not how we do business. We only charge you fees if we win money for you, and then, only a percentage of your winnings that we've already agreed to. That way, you and we share the same road. We don't want to prolong a case just to churn up new fees. We both want the most we can get for your case and we both want the case over with as fast as possible. Our interests are aligned.
We only recover our out-of-pocket expenses if we get you money.
We've been doing this for almost 30 years. We have had clients where we spent $10,000 and more of our own money on our investigation and in the initial stage of litigation, only to find out that the case was a tragic accident where no one was legally at fault. Those clients never paid us a nickel. We simply chalked those costs up as the cost of doing business. If you hire us, the only time you'll have to pay back our expenses is if we get your claim settled or win a jury verdict for compensation.
What are expenses in this context? Lots of clients get tripped up on this. Expenses are not attorney's fees---you're not paying us or our staff by the hour. Instead, expenses come from things like filing fees for submitting legal documents to the court or paying videographers during depositions. We don't make money on any of these expenses: if we're charged $100 for something necessary for your case, we only charge back $100 when your case is over.
Further, you're given the chance to look over every single expense we've incurred before you sign off on the case being closed. We're 100% above board about what we had to spend on your case.
You can afford an experienced lawyer with a great track record.
We're able to make our legal services available to you by only charging a percentage of what we're able to receive. But make no mistake: you're in the driver's seat. YOU are the client, and while we'll certainly offer you our best judgment, in the end it's up to you to decide whether a case settles or you'd prefer to go trial.
Don't let the defendant's expensive lawyers beat you. Call us today for a free consultation at 1-855-326-0000.