You’ve never purchased a house?
Pardon my ignorance, but why would a home purchase require a lawyer?
I’ve heard that some land transfers in the US happen without lawyers, but here in Canada (where, if memory serves, EmAnJ is from), it is almost impossible to transfer land without one. It can be done, of course; but most people find that it is more efficient and cost-effective in the long run to have a lawyer do it.
Land titles can be complicated, depending on the title/registry system in place, and you’ll want someone who knows how to deal with whatever circumstances arise as a result of a title search. For example, if there is a lien or caveat or some other removeable encumbrance of some sort, you’ll want someone who knows how to clear them off title before the property conveys. Or, if necessary, a lawyer can put a lien on, to make sure the deal completes and the property transfers as intended. Additionally, a lawyer can help represent your interests when dealing with banks or mortgage companies as well–a mortgage is just a contract (and a complicated one at that), and I’d rather have somebody who knows contracts and mortgages, and who represents my interests, explain mine to me; rather than somebody who is acting in the mortgagee’s interests. Lastly, land transfers and mortgages can require documents to be sworn; and here in Canada, the only people licensed to take oaths are commissioners (most of whom are found in lawyer’s offices) and notaries public (most of whom are lawyers–we have very few notaries who are not lawyers). A lawyer provides a one-stop-shop for all this advice and these services.
Thanks, Spoons. That’s definitely not common here in California. I don’t know about other parts of the country. And having once been a notary public, I can tell you that the vast majority locally aren’t lawyers.
I’ve never personally needed a lawyer and thus never had to fire one, but in the course of practicing law I’ve met some lawyers that I wouldn’t piss on were they actually on fire.
Mmm, very interesting. I wouldn’t have seen the red flags in the beginning at all, but by the end would have started to catch on. Is there any way to sort of “review” your lawyer, so others know what s/he is like?
Some sort of Yelp for Lawyers. Or ratemylawyer.com. Or something.
You know, for whatever reason, that didn’t even occur to me. I haven’t had occasion to go back to the insurance’s website since I first had to find a lawyer. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that they have some sort of lawyer review process.
Oddly, I find the idea of publicly criticizing an individual to be more…intimidating?..distasteful?..something…than I would if I were criticizing a corporation or a restaurant that had provided me with poor service. I feel like I’d have to find some balance between being vague enough to stay relatively anonymous, if possible, and still providing enough information to the public to explain why I didn’t like this guy, other than saying “he sucks.” I’ll have to look at my options and contemplate that.
No problem; glad to explain. Yes, I find that a little odd–that notaries need not be lawyers in the US–but if that’s the way things are there, then that’s the way things are.
I’m not sure why typically only lawyers can be notaries in Canada, but I will say that in my experience, some of the things I’ve been asked to notarize have required legal advice on the matter. Maybe it’s an efficiency thing–as we well know here at the SDMB, only a lawyer can provide legal advice; so if the matter requires it, the lawyer/notary can answer whatever question the client has right then and there, without making the client run off to find a lawyer. But that’s only a guess; I have no idea what the real reason is.
Asimovian, it’d be great if you could review him (while staying relatively anonymous). Your lawyer review would stick out because you’re a paralegal - who better to judge competence? Of course, you could always say “hey look, I’m in the law business, I know what’s what, and he does suck” 
Also, often a restaurant only has 1-2 owners, so although you’re not calling them out by name per se, it has the same effect on them in a business sense as it would a lawyer.
Here in MA, pretty much every mortgage or home equity loan closing is handled by a lawyer, though he’s working for the bank. But when you first sign a Purchase & Sales agreement to buy a house, it’s an excellent idea to have a lawyer look over it first, especially when the realtor tells you it isn’t necessary. The “standard” form that two different realtors have handed us have been so biased towards the seller & the agent that it’s ridiculous. Getting a lawyer to negotiate out terms like “if the house burns down between now and the closing in 6 weeks, the seller gets to keep your $50k deposit.” is a really good idea.
[quote=“Spoons, post:29, topic:554545”]
Notaries in the US don’t do anything except notarize (AKA witness and date-stamp) signatures. That isn’t exactly rocket science. Most banks have a notary or three that customers can use free of charge, btw. Often a branch manager or a senior bank teller.
If attorneys are also notaries in the US, it’s usually for their own convenience, rather than to offer the service to the public.
It’s amazing how powerful a certified coldly professional letter on a lawyer’s letterhead can be. Not always, but often.
I was a juror in a legal malpractice case. It was a bit of a nightmare because of its complexity, and took over three weeks. In a nutshell, the plaintiff had been pursuing a wrongful termination suit for over 5 years and had it dropped because the attorney did not file certain paperwork on time.
The lesson I took away from this was that if your case requires specialized legal expertise (unlike **Asimovian’s **case), hire specialized legal expertise.
To the layperson, a lawyer spends all their time suing people and showing up in court. But watching my parents’ attorneys (different ones are different specialists) over the years and having a few close friends whose parents are practicing has proven that often a sizable portion of what they do is write ice cold letters to the people trying to harass their clients.
I’m 33, and I’m chiming in: I’ve also never had reason to engage a lawyer’s services. I have bought a house; my realtor handled all the administrivia for me. Any car accidents that have happened since I reached the age of majority have been the fender-bender type for small amounts of money or time to fix. Just lucky, I guess.
I had a terrible experience with a lawyer when I was young. I have to remind myself not to let it prejudice me against the entire profession.
When I was 15, I was involved in a personal injury lawsuit. The case was complicated enough that it took several years to wrap up and eventually aspects of it ended up in front of my state’s supreme court.
I found out the results, not through my lawyer, but through a big spread about me and my case in the newspaper and a fairly mean spirited op-ed column. Pretty traumatizing to 18-year old me.
Two days after the stuff in the paper came out, I got a call from my lawyer. “Yeah, sorry about that. They were supposed to let me call you before the articles ran.”
Or, perhaps, he has needed one, but couldn’t afford one, so did without.
That’s me. The one time I looked at getting a lawyer (my boss fired me for going to chemotherapy; further complicated by the fact that the company was too small for federal law to apply, so I’d have had to pursue under state law), every lawyer I spoke to was so doom and gloom about my odds (“Well, I can’t tell you not to pursue this, but are you suuuuuuuure you want to?”) that I figured that at the end, it was likely I’d just have wasted a couple years and tens of thousands of dollars I don’t have on the whole thing. Under other circumstances I would have pursued looking for a judgment that would also cover my legal costs, so I would (in theory) not be out much money of my own, but being unemployed, broke, and sick (and what company is going to hire someone in the middle of chemo), I couldn’t afford to take the chance. Which is, I’m sure, what my ex-boss was counting on.
I’ll probably run into this again at some point – where someone who actually had money would go hire a lawyer, but since I don’t, I just have to accept that I’m getting screwed.
Kaio, I’m so sorry. I guess it’s so ingrained in us in high school that “everyone has a fair trial” and in the Miranda rights that everyone gets a lawyer, even if they can’t afford one. Wrongful termination is tricky as well. I’ve been extremely fortunate in my life. When the guy I had the fender-bender with threatened to sue, my father didn’t talk to me for a week. It was a horrible feeling, but ultimately temporary and inexpensive.
All that stuff has to do with when you are accused of a crime. There is no right to representation in a civil matter.
Employment discrimination cases are often done on contingency (meaning, the attorney is paid out of the winnings – they only get paid if you win). Most contingency attorneys will take a case if either a)it is strong enough factually to potentially win OR b)it is not strong enough to win, but strong enough to bring the company to the table to settle, because there is some “triable issue” that cannot be dismissed. If 4 or 5 contingency attorneys don’t want to take your case, you have a very weak case.
That sucks, but the law doesn’t claim to remedy every possible wrong.
Civil matters are just as bad, they can still make your life hell and bankrupt you. Sigh.