Over the last couple days, in addition to other things, which I'll talk about later, I've been doing some serious soul searching to determine if I really needed a law office outside the home. Because I actually want this to work, I realize I need to focus on two critical factors: managing cash flow; and getting clients. And an office raises serious questions for each.
Now, before I say this, understand that I am all for the home office, and if my practice was going to focus more on transactional work or other work that was more document centric, I'd be all for the home office. But I think certain practice areas require an office space, and even further, I think for some practice areas an office can help to inspire client confidence (it is required because of confidence expectations). I think criminal defense (one of my practice areas) in particular requires some established office space to function effectively.
The managing cash flow aspect of law practice makes signing up for any client space rather scary. Rents in Seattle can vary from $675/month to $1500/month, which can be a fairly heavy burden when beginning to open a practice. Your first goal from a business standpoint should be to break even, and it gets that much harder with each expense that is added.
But, on the other hand, you need to get clients in the door, and an office can help establish your law firm as reputable. And even further, I like the thought of differentiating work from home, and keeping my home life private from all of my clients. Having an office helps me, at least, stay on task, looks good for clients, and also, in the end, makes you feel like a real life lawyer (I don't pull any punches on here).
So, a lot of my day today was spent scouting out possible office space. My first decision was location. After careful consideration, I decided that my office space needs to be located downtown, near the courthouse. This makes the courthouse accessible to me, makes my office accessible to clients (transit runs heavily to downtown), and makes me seem like a real life criminal defense lawyer.
Most of the locations I looked at were office sharing arrangements with other lawyers or law firms. The reason for this is simple - I would love to have some other attorneys around to (a) potentially get work from, and (b) have some people to talk to that first month or so when I'm waiting for the phone to ring. Of the spaces I found (check your local bar bulletin - these days everyone has free space they are looking to lease out), the attorneys currently in the office practiced criminal law, business law, elder law, family law, and even insurance defense. And they were all relatively close to each other.
So who did I pick as my number one (this, of course, is before even looking at the office or speaking with the lessors about terms)? I picked the criminal law firm to check out first. They are in one of my practice areas, have an established practice, and were the most reasonably priced. Because criminal law at this point is the weakest of my practice area, I could use the (probable) run off business and the ears to bend when I have questions. I'll be checking them out in the next week or so and let you know what I decide.
Other than that, I've been continuing to post to my Seattle criminal defense blog and my Washington eminent domain blog, as well as creating as many links as possible. I've also been looking into virtual reception services, pinning down my legal research costs, and doing a couple of other things.
But, you know what? It's Friday, the Masters is on, and I don't really feel like writing much more today. So, look for me on Monday, when I'll expound a little bit on what I've done to start my law firm.
And don't forget, if you have any questions or comments, feel free to ask. It's really hard to get everything I do in here, so I might have looked into something you are considering and might be able to give you a little information about it. Have a great weekend.
UPDATE - 10/7/09: I ended up picking the office downtown with the criminal defense firm and it was just about the best decision I could make. First, it helps me to separate work and home, even if just a little bit. Second, it makes me feel like a real lawyer going downtown to work everyday. And third, it's made a big difference in signing up clients. For me, choosing this location is probably one of the reasons I've been able to have some success. So, put some thought into it. Location really can make a big difference.
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