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Illinois Divorce and Family Law Weblog

Helping You and Your Family get through DivorceSM.
Weblog of DuPage County Attorney Raiford D. Palmer, focusing on divorce and family law.
(Copyright© 2005-2008 by Raiford D. Palmer. All rights reserved.) This blog is for advertising only and the contents are not legal advice.

Monday, May 16, 2005

Illinois Divorce Lawyer -- Legal Fees -- How much will it cost?

Again, this depends on the people involved in the case and the issues.

A simple case with modest assets and debt, no children is obviously going to be less expensive in terms of attorneys' fees and costs than a more complex case. Disputed issues will cost more--more attorney time, additional costs, et cetera. Disputes about custody for example can be very expensive when you consider that a Court might appoint a child representative and possibly a psychologist to evaluate the custody situation.

Filing Fees and Expenses

Filing fees alone in Cook County are about $270 to initiate a case, and about $100 to file an Appearance (the document filed by the Respondent or his/her attorney acknowledging that they are officially in the case). Serving the suit on a party is perhaps a $40-100 expense depending on whether you use the County Sheriff or have a private process server serve your spouse. Other costs during the case can include copy charges, deposition charges, mileage, tolls, and parking for court appearances, and more. Expect at least $500 in costs for the basic case, perhaps $1000 and up for more complex cases.

Attorneys' Fees

These vary by attorney and case, but you can expect a range of perhaps $200-300 per hour depending on the attorney's experience, location (city vs. suburbs) and so on. Some attorneys like our firm will bill a flat fee for uncontested cases. It makes sense to shop around for an attorney you can get along with and charges a reasonable fee. While hourly fees may seem excessive, remember that the lawyer isn't pocketing the entire fee--a lot of that money covers rent, employees, insurance and so on. Be sure to ask about how the fees are charged--are you billed in tenths of an hour (six minutes), or quarter hours? These are minimum charges. For example, if you call a lawyer billing you .1 hours (six minutes) minimum and talk for five minutes, you are billed .1 hours. But have the same conversation with a firm charging a minimum of .25 hours and you just paid almost triple for the same call. So even though the rate may be better, you need to look at the minimum increment as well.

Please call attorney Raiford Palmer at 630.434.0400 Ext. 165 for a free consultation.

posted by Raiford Palmer at 4:06 PM