ABOUT BIDWELL LAW
The essence of the law I practice is the transfer of assets from a person who has died to his or her heirs. Common terms for this type of law are estate planning, trusts, wills and probate. This area of law has two major components, transactional law and civil law.
Transactional law is the accurate and competent preparation of legal documents. Examples of legal documents are trusts, wills, deeds, affidavits and forms needed for probate administration. These documents preserve assets and build wealth.
For transactional legal documents, I provide a fixed price quote at our first meeting. This alleviates the concern about excessive attorney costs. You can either accept the quote or shop around for a better price.
Civil law is litigation. Litigation is most often between relatives over assets. Litigants want justice, fairness and quick resolution. Often a litigant’s motivation is desperation or the desire to punish.
Litigation is not cheap. Litigation will cause harm. A good outcome is minimal harm. The relationship between attorney and client is critical. Can we work together? Are our values and goals the same? Can we agree on a game plan? The answers determine if we move forward or not.
MEET MARK BIDWELL
While at the University of Colorado I started a newspaper for the business school. It was great fun putting the pieces together of reporting, marketing and collaborating with others to produce a weekly school paper.
I graduated with a degree in accounting and went on to supervise the accounting departments and later the data processing departments of medium sized companies. During this period, I acquired the credential of Certified Public Accountant (CPA).
This was over 35 years ago. Then as now, I had no tolerance for sexual nonsense or racial prejudice. I embraced diversity. As a result, I had very competent and self-motivated staffs. But opportunities for advancement were limited. Each company has many accountants, but only one CFO.
So, it was time to go back to school. Instead of obtaining a master’s degree, I thought why not a law degree? Law seemed infinitely more interesting than working for a corporation. By the way, it is. I graduated from Loyola Law School, located in downtown Los Angeles and discovered a new passion.
I had the experience of how a business works and the education of how law works. It was a great opportunity to start my own business. For 20 years I have had my own law firm as what is commonly referred to as a “sole practitioner.” It is the same head rush I had with my own newspaper back in college.
To keep the phone ringing, I need satisfied clients. It starts with my honest and sincere assessment of your situation. To continue, we must have mutual respect to form a productive attorney-client relationship. At the end, you need to feel that your time and money was well spent.
I invite you to contact me. Your situation may be straightforward or as complex as a bar exam question. Let’s be respectful of each other’s time. This is not the time for the ego to take over. It is a time to assess what is the next step.