Depression in Law School

Coping with Depression in Law School

admin

Where does depression hurt? All jokes about commercials aside, depression hurts law students everywhere. People form all walks of life go through moments of depression, and law student really are no different. If you’re in law school and starting to feel the sharp pangs of depression, don’t worry — you are not alone. In fact, you’re actually in good — albeit silent — company. There are a lot of law student struggling with depression as they try to get used to a new world that will demand more of them than they could have ever imagined.

I say this a lot on this blog, but the truth is that law school is definitely a winner take all system. You don’t want to walk into law school thinking that you will be able to just skate by and still get a top paying law firm job. It just doesn’t happen that way. When people realize this, they become depressed at the level of work necessary to be the best.

Of course, there are plenty of law blogs that say that your efforts are always going to be rewarded — I strongly disagree, and I challenge other law students to step up and admit that it really does take giving your absolute best in order to get anywhere. The students that have the best grades and the best overall package are the ones that are going to look forward to a six figure salary at the end of the whole ordeal. The ones that focused more on partying and making friends are not going to make it out with that type of cash. The truth hurts, but you have to know this going in so that you plan your attack better. Read more »

law degree

Combining Your Law Degree with Other Graduate Studies

admin

Have you thought about combining your law degree studies with another graduate-style program? If you have, don’t worry — you’re in good company. Even if you haven’t thought much about combining your law degree, you will find that there is actually a lot of opportunity to pursue a joint degree — which is what the combination is called.

You have a few options when it comes to pursuing a joint degree. You can cross your law degree with medicine (very common) or business (also very common). Not sure what to choose? Don’t worry; I actually thought the same thing.

While I decided not to ultimately pursue two degrees at once, I have several friends that made the decision and are very happy about it. You will need to think about whether or not you’re willing to stay in school longer. If you know that you want to take a job as soon as you can from law school, you will need to make sure that you pursue just one degree. It’s very difficult to work full time and pursue a courseload like this — a lot of people have tried, and a lot of people have failed. You will need to make sure that you look at your options from every angle, so that there really aren’t any concerns about how you will ever get things done.

Pursuing a cross between a law degree and any other field will give you the skills to pursue law in that industry. You will have a much better field of knowledge than a lawyer that just focuses on law. While it’s true that you do get exposed to all different types of law in law school, having that extra experience from your second degree will give you a leg up. In the case of medicine, it usually means that you will be in the legal side of medicine, which can be very lucrative. Every hospital needs a skilled legal team, and many doctors work directly with lawyers to take care of the legal issues surrounding their practices. Read more »

Real-Estate-Lawyer-300x204

Yes, You Really Do Need a Real Estate Lawyer!

admin

Here’s the obvious point: buying a home is a pretty big deal. However, even though that sounds obvious, you might be surprised at how many people really don’t bother trying to get a lawyer on their side at all. They think that a real estate lawyer isn’t necessary, and they can be skipped over. This is actually bad advice, because buying a home is a lot more complicated than it looks.

It’s true — you really do need a real estate lawyer, but you might not be convinced until you really look at what a real estate lawyer does.

The real estate attorney that’s right for you will actually do a lot more than you think. For starters, they’ll review all of the documents involved in the purchase of the home, including the legal descriptions and the title insurance policy. You will be getting their expertise in a big way, because they can scan these documents and make sure that everything looks good.

However, what if things don’t look good? They have the power to change legal language in a purchase contract or even use state laws to void the purchase contract altogether — is that something that you think you can do on your own?

It can be scary for an individual or even a couple to work with the mortgage loan officer, the seller’s attorney (trust us; the seller will probably have their own representation — why wouldn’t you get your own lawyer if you could help it?) — and of course, the real estate agents on both sides. In a way, having an attorney is a great way to make sure that the real estate agent stays honest. We don’t want to assume that all real estate agents are shady, but when there’s a lot of money at stake, there are times where people take shortcuts that they normally wouldn’t.

Now, you might wonder about the actual cost of hiring a real estate lawyer. It can be done on a flat fee or up to an hourly rate, which is what you want to try to avoid if you can. Make sure that no matter what type of fee structure your attorney asks you for that you don’t just go without a contract agreement — you want to have every responsibility spelled out — why not get started looking for the real estate attorney of your dreams today? You’ll be glad that you did!

Recording-Conversations

The Legal High Points of Recording Conversations

admin

Ah, the things people say. It can either get us in trouble, or it can help us. It just depends on what’s going on. If you are in the middle of a series of conflicts with someone, it does become tempting to record them eventually. Or you might just like the sound of someone’s voice, and you want to capture it on a recording to make sure that you have it.

We all know about Watergate, the infamous case of recording gone wild in the White House during President Nixon’s time. However, that’s dealing with government. What you’re probably interested in is finding out whether or not it’s legal for you as a private citizen to record someone’s conversations with you.

Generally speaking, it is not legal for you to record a conversation that is mean tot be private. It’s an invasion of privacy, but there are exceptions to the rule. Some states only require that one person in the conversation gives consent for the conversation to be recorded. This means that if you’re talking to someone and you want to record the call, you can record the conversation. However, if you are talking with someone that lives in a state that requires all parties to consent to being recorded, you could be in trouble.

If you record a call without someone’s consent and their consent is required, then it’s an illegal recording and the person whose privacy you just violated can turn around and sue you. Of course, just the mere discovery that you recorded them can make them take you to court. Invading someone’s privacy is a serious matter, and many courts have sided with the person wronged.

It’s a civil lawsuit, not a criminal one, which means that you would probably have to pay some sort of damages. Of course, this also assumes that the act of recording hurt the other person in some way, which is something that they would have to prove.

You might have noticed a theme of privacy here — if a conversation can be reasonably assumed to be private, then it has special protection. Now, if you and a friend are out in public, and you are recording them for some reason, they can’t go back and really make too much fuss — if other people could hear the conversation, then it’s not really public anymore.

These are sticky issues that should be raised with an attorney experienced in the matter, if you want more than general information — be careful out there!

slander_law

Libel, Slander, and You – Avoiding Trouble and Big Fines

admin

Libel. Slander. No matter which term people are using, it usually leads to one thing: big fines, and a lot of publicity. It’s something that a lot of people are interested in figuring out, especially after so many celebrities seem to fling these terms around.

If you’re someone that really wants to know the difference between the two, then this guide is definitely for you!

Let’s start with slander. Slander is when you say something about someone in a public manner that could harm the person’s reputation and cause damage. For example, you see this a lot when comedians or anyone else takes a few too many cracks at a celebrity. That usually brings on a slander lawsuit, which is almost always settled out of court. That way, the terms are not required to be disclosed by anyone.

The thing about slander that’s important is that there have to be special damages — that is, that the victim of the slander has to prove that they lost money. Yet there are times where slander doesn’t need special damages. If you accuse someone of having AIDS, for example, they don’t have to prove special damages. If you accuse a woman of being “loose” or “unchaste”, they don’t have to prove special damages. These are rooted in more historical times, but these points still have legal teeth.

So what about libel? Well, libel is all about the written word — as in, saying things that aren’t true about someone in books, magazines, or even online. The Internet has really made the whole thing kinda complicated, because now it’s very public. For example, if you write something about someone else on a message board and it’s not true, you’re committing libel. It can come back to bite you in some crazy ways — especially if you’re running a website while you’re doing it.

The person you’re attacking could have the legal muscle to have the website shut down. Website providers are really trying hard not to get tangled up in things like that, which means that if there’s any hint of legal trouble they’re usually going to run the other direction — shutting your site down in the process, of course.

So, at the end of the day, what does slander and libel really mean to you? It means that you need to make sure that you don’t express opinions as fact — keep them as opinions, and you’ll be fine!

Small Claims Court

Your First Trip to Small Claims Court – What to Do and What to Avoid

admin

Small claims court is something that we tend not to think too much about — unless we’re sitting down on the couch to watch another episode of one of those daytime legal shows. However, if you find that you can’t get something worked out between you and an associate or even a business owner, small claims court might be just where you need to go.

In a perfect world, everyone would be able to afford a lawyer, but there are just some cases that are honestly too small for a lawyer to take on. If you want to make sure that they get taken care of still, small court is definitely your best answer. It’s perfect for when you have actual damages and fees that need to be corrected. If you can put a dollar sign on your problem and it’s under $3,000, small claims court is definitely where you need to go.

Keep in mind that it can take a while to make small claims court work for you. You will usually need to file a civil complaint, which will start the process. This is of course if you are actually suing someone. You need to make sure that you have a lot of evidence, such as receipts, statements, photos, witnesses…you get the idea. You don’t want to go into court trying to present “he said, she said” information. That’s called hearsay, and the judge will not give you what you want based on hearsay.

Whether you are doing the suing or being sued, it’s important to make sure that you make it to court on time. You don’t have to worry about someone not getting the message that they have to come to court. You can have the papers served to the other party by a process server or even a sheriff in some cases.

Being sued is not something pleasant, but that doesn’t mean that you have to just take a default judgment against you — which is what happens if you don’t show up! Small claims court is a chance for your side to be heard as well before the judge. If you have evidence to refute the claims brought up against you, you can win your case. Read more »

Benefits of Having a Lawyer

The Subtle Benefits of Having a Lawyer in Your Business Operations

admin

Everyone has seen the Godfather at least a few times. If you haven’t, it’s definitely a great movie. You see, the real strength of the Godfather didn’t always come from the armed muscle on the streets, or even the politicians and policemen that the Don held in his back pocket. The real strength, if you will, came from the man that always seemed to be able to stay in the room when everyone else had to leave.

That man was Tom Hagen, the lawyer for the Corleone family. When something legal needed to be taken care of, Tom took care of it. Even though he was in a position that technically should have been held by an Italian (according to the Mafia rules), the German-Irish lawyer still held his position and controlled a great deal of power in his own right.

Now, you might not be running your business Mafia style, but the truth is that there are some subtle benefits to hiring a lawyer to handle some of your business affairs. In the Godfather movies, Hagen was definitely an asset to the Don because he could advise the Don on issues that hadn’t even become issues yet. Your lawyer can do the same thing for your business, from looking at business contracts to even helping you start a new business the right way from the ground up — from incorporation to mergers and acquisitions. Every large corporation would be helpless without its legal team in place. Now, when you’re starting out you don’t need an army of lawyers. You just need one lawyer and you need to make sure that you get a few things out of the way.

If you have a business plan already, then it’s a good idea to let the lawyer in on what’s going on. You don’t have to always jump into the specifics, but giving the lawyer a clear head’s up on what’s going on can help them plan with you. Read more »

Prenuptial Agreement

Hiring a Lawyer to Draft a Prenuptial Agreement

admin

No one likes to mix legalese with the joys of becoming married, but the truth of the matter is that there comes a time to discuss the legal side of marriage. When two people are coming into a marriage with assets, it’s never a bad thing to get a legal agreement in place that basically says what happens when a divorce occurs. While no one wants to assume that their marriage will be one that ends in divorce, the truth of the matter is that you have to plan for everything. If you plan to have children in the marriage, then you also have to realize that you’re thinking about their needs as well as your own.

It can be hard to stop and really look into it from this perspective, but this is really the best way to go. You don’t want to try to skip over taking care of what needs to be taken care of.

Now, you might think that you could do a pre-nuptial agreement on your own, without a lawyer. This is true — there are boilerplate agreements out there that are a lot less costly than hiring a lawyer. However, a lawyer can give you a higher level of customization than those other templates can, and customization is important. How else are you going to make sure that you get everything handled to your satisfaction? In addition, if you have any questions that need to be answered, you won’t have the lawyer’s expertise backing you up. You’ll have to hope and pray that the answer is online in a format that you can trust. It’s just better for your own peace of mind to hire a lawyer rather than trust a template to one of the most important decisions of your life. Now, if you are going through a subsequent marriage where you already shelled out for a lawyer in the past, then you might have more reason to go with a template rather than a lawyer.

Back to the subject at hand. If you’re thinking about going with a lawyer to draft a prenuptial agreement, it’s important to make sure that you are definitely thinking carefully when it comes to the search. You don’t want to end up going with the wrong type of lawyer — you want to deal with a family affairs lawyer, first and foremost. While it’s true that law is law, a specialist is definitely better in this case than a generalist.

Experience is the name of the game here. You will need to make sure that you actually look for a lawyer that’s drafted numerous prenuptial agreements over the years. If you have a friend that has one, you might want to ask them about their lawyer and see what they say. You can also call around to some lawyers in other fields and ask who they would go to if they had to get a pre-nuptial agreement drafted. This can help you really determine who’s good and who isn’t good.

When you meet up with the lawyer that you want, you shouldn’t hold back on your questions. That said, you also want to be honest about your situation. You don’t want to brag or discuss assets that aren’t really yours. It’s important to be honest because the lawyer will not be able to draft a good agreement if they don’t have that type of information.

Overall, it’s a great time to get a pre-nuptial agreement drafted. If you really take the time to get your questions answered and find the best lawyer for the job, you’ll have no regrets about walking down the aisle with the person you want to marry — get started today!

Hiring a Lawyer to Incorporate Your Company – Good Idea or Waste of Time

admin

When it’s time to actually incorporate your company, you really don’t want to waste time. The truth is that if you really want to get the most favorable terms from the IRS, you will need to incorporate as soon as possible. Of course, you can actually incorporate later but you might end up running out of time to really get things done.  Then you’re stuck paying a lot more to the IRS and even filing multiple tax returns. If you incorporate later in the tax year, you will need to file a return for the sole proprietorship and also for the company that you held. It can really add a lot of time to your tax preparation, but it’s very important to get this right. If you don’t claim all of the income, the IRS can get you later on for documentation. If you haven’t saved the documentation, then you can end up not only paying back taxes, but fees and penalties. This is just not what you really want to deal with. Getting subject to backup withholding is very costly, but other businesses definitely engage in the practice quite often.

The best thing that you can do is to make sure that you get a lawyer. Now, in today’s DIY culture getting a lawyer to incorporate your business is something that’s considered old and outdated. You can always download the forms to file with your state’s Secretary of State, and you can even download the IRS tax form to become a closely held S corporation. It’s just a matter of knuckling down and getting started, which means that you will need to decide first on the lawyer.

Something as critical as incorporation should be handled by a lawyer. They will have the expertise to not only incorporate your company, but make sure that you avoid mistakes that could make it harder for you to sell the company to someone else, or to have someone come in and invest in your business. If you’re determined to DIY, then you have to also accept some of the consequences that could come from filing the paperwork wrong.

If you have decided to actually go with getting help with your business incorporation, then you need to figure out how to get a lawyer on your side. Read more »

Personal Injury Lawyer

What Type of Documentation Do You Need to Give a Personal Injury Lawyer?

admin

Getting into an accident, especially one that you know wasn’t your fault, can really take all of the energy out of your day. When you can step back and see all of the obligations that you’re missing out on because of someone else’s negligence, it can really make you angry. There’s nothing wrong with feeling angry, but you’ll need to do more than just get mad to take care of your family through all seasons. If you’ve been the victim of an accident, you need to make sure that you contact a personal injury lawyer as soon as possible.

Now, a lot of people feel that it’s wrong to sue someone else because you got hurt in an accident. However, you have to stop and think about it form the right perspective. Is the other person going to take care of your family? If you’re hurt and you can’t work, who will be covering the bills? If you’re facing an actual corporation, you have to step back and realize that this is where companies carry insurance in the first place. That doesn’t mean that you should fight these companies on your own — you will still need to make sure that you’re carrying the right attorney at your side. A personal injury lawyer has the expertise to make sure that you’re getting everything that you deserve, when you need to have it.

You can’t just hire a personal injury attorney and think that your job is over. On the contrary — you will need to still make sure that you have certain information that can be used in your case.

1. Police Report

If your accident was on the highway, in a public area, or anywhere else that’s visible, you will need to make sure that you get a police report. Having someone natural take a statement of what happened is one of the best things that you can do. This should be one of the first things that you collect for your lawyer.

2. Statement of Expenses

If you’re out of work due to the accident, then you will need to bring a list of the expenses that you’ve incurred because of the accident. These also need to include any and all medical expenses that you’ve incurred, even if it’s just a copay from your insurance company. You will need to make sure that you have had yourself checked out after an accident. Even if you think that you feel fine, accident symptoms have a way of showing up later, long after the opportunity to seek compensation has been closed off to you. Your family deserves fast action, which is why it’s so important to make sure that you seek damages and compensation as soon as possible.

3. Contact Information for the Other Party

Once you hire a personal injury attorney to handle your case, you will need to make sure that they are the ones that speak with the other party. If they have already acquired representation, then it’s time to just let lawyer talk to lawyer. You don’t want to step in and try to automatically get your way — it doesn’t work like this. In addition, personal injury is a complicated subject and you will need to let the experts figure out a solution that works for both parties. Sometimes the other party will settle out of court to make things easier.

It can be hard to sit back on the sidelines when your whole life seems to demand justice and compensation for what’s happened to you, but that’s what you’re going to have to do. Believe us, it’s a lot easier to let the lawyers battle it out than to try to get involved. All you have to worry about is getting the information they need, as well as finding the lawyer in the first place. If you can handle both of those tasks, then you will definitely be one step closer to getting the resolution you need!

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »
Powered by Law Tips | Great Law Blog.