The "my lawyer is fantastic" thread

[ELBKnow]

I have read a lot of complaints on here about lawyers. Bu mine is awesome. Thorough and smart. Just saying...they exist.

I kno we can't recommend. But if you have a good story...let's be positive...

[tcreegan]

Hi ELBKnow,

Good job finding a great attorney!

Sometimes it is not as much a good/bad attorney as a mismatch of styles. After reading plenty of posts, these seem to be the major sticking points....
Communication: phone/email/face-to-face, secretary/paralegal/attorney, turnaround time on responses
Organizaton/work ethic: dot all i's, cross all t's or 'good enough,' document filed ASAP or 'before the deadline'
Competence: know the local trustees, judges, filed cases like yours, up-to-date on relevant court rulings
Retainer/Fee: exactly what is covered, what is extra, what to expect as 'extra'

Glad you found an awesome attorney!!

Tom in Colo

[panda]

Our lawyer has been able to help us make decisions on some very important things we thought would not be possible to do in our bankruptcy chapter seven. Because of her extensive experience, and the fact she used to be a trustee she knows things inside out. We will know for sure how great she is once we get past the 341, but so far everything she has said we would be able to do, we have read up on and it looks like she is right.

This compares to a bad experience prior to her that had us running scared with me in tears.

I like her and would recommend her to anyone. I would elaborate, but we are in a small town and like being invisible.

[eventsdj]

My lawyer was great as well. As I was very nervous about nothing.. and she told me "Its my job to take care of this for you, thats why you pay me.. If you don't hear from me, there is no problem" and she was right. I get bummed reading about all the attorney issues! Wish all were as great as mine.

[df04527]

Well - we have this BK just filed last week and we are lucky enough to have a custody case going on at the same time. Talk about stress. Our team of lawyers are awesome and we are very pleased with them BUT we have a LARGE issue with gross negligence on the part of the OC in the second case. I've been trying to find out and our lawyers are also checking in to it but we want to hold the OC liable to make us whole again. There was never any basis and the OC handed the case over to his staff to handle - so OC was not aware he had no case until depo of his own client that he witnessed!

There HAS to be some way we can hold him (or someone) liable - within this case or a civil one. We are out alot of money because of his gross incompetence. I've been wanting to ask here but haven't. I trust you guys but understand it's outside the realm of this forum.

Sorry to stray....

[justbroke]

Mine was awesome too. His price was right within my budget and he fought for me on a stay violation issue. In fact, I ended up getting about $3K more than I paid him.

I filed pro se.

[calco86]

Great

My lawyer isn't bad, he just isn't friendly and really short with you. We were on a small budget and 900 wasnt bad, but I wish we got someone more helpful. Great job!

[keepinitreal]

I filed pro se.

You're my hero! How many hours do you estimate you spent in total for the Chapter 13 and Chapter 7?

[Exployer1234]

I had a great lawyer. She always called me back and answered all my questions. She had all the paperwork and bases covered, and she really was very reasonable in price.

[justbroke]

You're my hero! How many hours do you estimate you spent in total for the Chapter 13 and Chapter 7?

Hundreds. Probably 1,000 hours total from July 2008 through discharge in June 2010.

[helpme2010]

I have a great lawyer. My lawyer and staff's one complaint about me is I ask them too many questions or try to push too much of what I have learned from this board on them. I still ask some questions, but have learned to relax, trust them, and let them do the job they know how to do. My lawyer is always prompt to answer my emails and helps me with all the complicated paperwork. Plus reduces my stress level by about 2000%

[tcreegan]

Hi all,

df, typically you would file the complaint w/ your state bar association

Nice helpme: Plus reduces my stress level by about 2000% ....you should put this in a card and send it for Christmas!

Tom in Colo

[Fallonedward]

I too believed that I had an "awesome" lawyer until the 341 that is.

That is the point I became very unimpressed with our attorney. He arrived 15 minutes late and was actually proud of this fact by stating these things never start on time, so why get here early. If that was his plan all along all he had to do was communicate that to me. Communication goes a long way toward trust.

My attorney neglected to scan numerous documents to the trustee and at the 341 the trustee stated
"I'm missing 2008, 2009 taxes, titles to the cars, pay stubs, and mortgage documents"

I turned to my attorney and stated I handed all of these documents to you during our 3 sessions and I'm sorry that you did not scan these to our trustee, I then turned to the trustee and said I have all of the documents you have just requested and here they are.
The trustee thanked me and stated that this was the conclusion of our meeting.

I was mad as hell at our attorney for first being late and for secondly not giving the trustee any of the documents that I had handed to him during our 3 meetings together. I had even said to our attorney at our last meeting "OK you are going to scan all of this over and include it with the filing right" He stated he would but alas he did not.

Now I feel like I wasted $1300 and I'm worried that he will not get my 2nd debtor class certificates filed in the 45 day window. I have two zombie creditors that surfaced after we filed and I wanted to include them but my attorney was going to charge me $100 each. I did them myself and just payed the $28 fee the court charges.

[df04527]

Wow Fallon.... ridiculous and good for you to take care of those zombies yourself.

Thanks TC - I plan on doing that also but thought I read they couldn't recover monetary damages for us.

I believe I just have to be diligent in finding out if recovery of money is even a possibility. This is wrong on so many levels. :/

[antrob]

I used legal helpers and I was very happy with them. Actually I never had to call them even once after I filed. I got my 341 letter in the mail, met the attorney at the hearing and 81 day later I was discharged and closed.