Meet with a Lawyer for Free
I first found Jonathan Dixon when the boyfriend and I were condo hunting last year. We knew we wanted a lawyer to help with all the communications and paperwork but how do you find a good one? All our friends were renting and family were in other towns.
Luckily, Jonathan has a monthly “Ask the Lawyer” night at Ennui Cafe in Rogers Park. He’s there on the first Tuesday of the month from 6:30 to 8:00. We figured we could go and get a personal sense of the guy. He turned out to be exactly what we wanted.
Right off the bat, you’ll be able to tell that he’s a straight-forward fellow. This isn’t someone who is going to go fishing for extra costs or do all that “lawyery” stuff that we’re always afraid that lawyers are going to do to us.
I was surprised that “Ask the Lawyer” wasn’t one of those content-less pitch sessions where the end result is that you’ll have to hire the guy to actually get some answers. He really does provide free legal consultation. Since there is no sign-up sheet though, it is first come-first served.
I’m smart. I read contracts word for word. I research the heck out of stuff I don’t know. So I really wanted someone trustworthy, on my side, and an additional worry or distraction to the already harrowing process of home buying.
Thank goodness for Jonathan. I don’t know if this rate still applies, but we paid him a $500 flat fee to oversee our closing. I’m certain we blew that hourly calculation out of the water. For all the requests and back-and forth we made, he never said a negative word. The boyfriend and I feel that we got a real bargain in his services. He’s certainly our first choice if we ever need legal aid again.