What is a proper personal attorney contingency fee?

What is a proper personal attorney contingency fee?

Michael Ehline (Attorney at Law) gives expert video advice on: Is there a minimum personal injury settlement amount?; Are medical bills included in a bodily injury award?; Can I ask my lawyer for a copy of my settlement check? and more...

Whether or not there is a proper personal injury contingency fee really depends upon the deal you strike with your attorney. Most good attorneys will not take on a cause for less than 33.3% pre-lawsuit filing. Once the lawsuit gets filed, then the attorney has to do a lot more work than if he would do if he was just dealing with an insurance company. So when that happens, the general proper recognized contingency fee would be 40%. However if the case has to go to trial and not just be litigated, most good personal injury attorneys are going to charge at least 45% contingency fee to take that case to trial. Taking a case to trial can sometimes take several weeks off an attorney's practice, and because of this, a good personal injury attorney will need to be compensated for that. But ultimately if the attorney is good, he is going to get you a lot more money than an attorney that is not good. So 45% of a million is much better than 25% or 20% of a hundred. That is the decision you have to make as a consumer.