Guide to Finding Charlotte North Carolina Lawyer

Charlotte North Carolina is a growing city with well over a million people in its metropolitan area. Home to numerous Fortune 500 companies, it is also America’s second greatest banking and investment center after New York City. With so much wealth concentrated in one area, it should be not at all shocking to hear that Charlotte is also home to countless lawyers and legal professionals. These Charlotte North Carolina lawyers can be a great resource if you ever find yourself in a traumatic legal situation, but at the same time it can be intimidating or even scary to look through the thousands of Charlotte North Carolina lawyers and pick the one that you want to represent you in court. However, with a little research into what Charlotte North Carolina lawyers do and how to find them, this process can become much easier.

Educations and Specializations of Charlotte North Carolina Lawyers

All Charlotte North Carolina lawyers have to go through a rigorous education of three years of specialized graduate school, followed by the passing of a rigorous bar examination over several days in all areas of law. Charlotte North Carolina lawyers are therefore properly qualified to practice any type of case given to them. Of course, some lawyers have particular qualifications and experiences for certain cases. You should ask a Charlotte North Carolina lawyer who you are considering hiring about their case records.

Additionally, some Charlotte North Carolina lawyers choose to get certified Specializations in their legal specialties from the North Carolina State Bar. These specialities include:

• Appellate law

• Bankruptcy law

• Criminal law

• Elder law

• Estate planning and probate law

• Family law

• Immigration law

• Real estate & property Law

• Worker’s compensation law

• Social security disability law

In order to obtain a specialization from the State Bar Board of Legal Specialization, a Charlotte North Carolina lawyer must meet several qualifications. They must be licensed to practice law in North Carolina; they must have at least five years of experience in the area in which they’d like to practice law; they must have taken extra classes in their speciality during the three year period before getting their specialization; they must pass a peer review; and they must get a satisfactory score on an examination in their area of expertise. Specializations are not required, but the extra work and dedication it takes to get one shows a Charlotte North Carolina lawyer’s mastery in a particular area of law, and it may be to your benefit to hire a specialist if one is available.

Where to Find a Charlotte NC Lawyer

You can find great Charlotte NC lawyers anywhere, which can in part be a problem. There are so many of them, it’s hard to know where to find the good ones and where the bad ones are. Thankfully, there are a few proven methods for obtaining excellent Charlotte NC lawyers for any of your legal needs. Here are just a few:

• Browse a directory: There are many different types of legal directories. Even your phone book, if you look under law, is a legal directory for your area. However, there are a few more reliable directories than that. The North Carolina State Bar prints an annual legal directory that you can use to find Charlotte NC lawyers who can help you. Refine your search by running a name through an internet search engine once you decide their practice might be of interest. Research them by looking at their website, seeing if anyone has posted reviews of their service, and looking for articles written by or about them. It isn’t required that your Charlotte NC lawyer be a member of the North Carolina State Bar Association, but it is a good sign if they are since the Bar has strict ethical codes of conduct.

• Search for areas of specialty: On the North Carolina State Bar Association’s website, a listing is given for every lawyer licensed with specialty. Find an experienced Charlotte NC lawyer with a pertinent speciality to help you by using this method.

• Use a referral service: It is more than a little frightening to call a person you’ve never met before for the purpose of hiring them to do an expensive job with everything from your personal wealth to your very freedom on the line. Make the proposition a little less risky by using a referral service. These work by having a discussion with a trained professional concerning your legal needs. You pay a nominal fee for the service, and the professional recommends a close-by Charlotte NC lawyer to help you. Then you get a free consultation with the recommended attorney. The best thing about referral services is that all their attorneys are pre-screened, so that is one less thing to worry about. The Mecklenburg County Bar runs a referral service which can be contacted at 704/375-0120. You can also see a referral fromNorth Carolina State Bar.

• Ask a friend or family member: It may not always come up in conversation, but legal stress is a common fact of contemporary American life. Anyone around you in your daily life may have important advice about finding a great Charlotte NC lawyer, but you won’t know unless you ask.

Reporting a Problem with Your Charlotte NC Lawyer

You hire a Charlotte NC lawyer to help you, but down the line it may seem that they’ve caused you more harm than good. Usually this is simply a reflection of how stressful legal situations can become, but if you decide that you’re angry with your Charlotte NC lawyer because they’ve committed an ethics violation, then there is something you can do. File a complaint with the North Carolina State Bar Grievance Commission.

If you have trouble understanding the fees your Charlotte North Carolina lawyer has charged you, or you don’t believe they are true to the spirit of your original fee agreement, you can seek reconciliation with your attorney in a supervised setting. The State Bar offers Fee Dispute Committees for these purposes. Call (919) 828-4620 and ask for the Attorney-Client Assistance Department.