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CHOOSING AN ESTATE PLANNING LAWYER IN CALIFORNIA

Law Office of Rodney Gould June 11, 2020

Choosing an estate planning attorney in California can be confusing, particularly if you’ve never hired a lawyer before. In order to help make this decision a little easier for you, we’ve compiled the following tips to help get you started with your search.

1) Ask friends and family for referrals – When embarking upon your attorney search, a great place to start is your friends and family. People you trust are often able to provide the names of estate planning attorneys they’ve worked within the past, and they’ll usually be candid with you about their experiences.

When seeking recommendations for California estate planning attorneys, the following questions are useful:

  • Is estate planning one of the attorney’s primary practice areas?

  • Why did you hire the attorney?

  • What was the outcome of your legal matter?

  • Would you hire the attorney again?

2) Arrange a consultation – Once you’ve identified an estate planning attorney you’d like to meet with, you should arrange a consultation. An in-person consultation is a great way to gauge your level of comfort with a particular attorney. After your consultation, you should evaluate the attorney based on several factors, including:

  • Attentiveness

  • Professionalism

  • Willingness to answer questions

  • Willingness to explain legal concepts

  • Compatibility with your personality

  • Experience

  • Past results

  • Demeanor

3) Go with experience and specialization – When choosing an estate planning attorney, go with experience and specialization. In other words, you should choose an attorney who devotes a significant portion of his or her practice to estate planning. As opposed to a criminal law attorney, for example, an attorney who has specialized in estate planning for several years is likely to have experienced situations like your own and be familiar with the intricacies of his or her practice area. Experience is important, as it often takes years to develop competence in even a single area of the law.

4) Check the attorney’s credentials – Finally, make sure that your prospective estate planning attorney is eligible to practice law in California. In order to legally practice law in California, an individual must be licensed by the State Bar of California. License information is available on the State Bar of California’s website.

California Estate Planning Attorneys

If you’re looking for personalized service by an experienced estate planning attorney, then Rodney Gould is the lawyer for you. When you come to the Law Office of Rodney Gould, you can rest assured that you’ll receive responsive, individualized counsel. By choosing the Law Office of Rodney Gould for your estate planning needs, not only will you stabilize your future, but you can rest assured that we’ll make the estate planning experience as easy and pleasant as possible. You can connect with us by calling us or by filling out one of the contact forms on our website.