How Much Will it Cost Me to Hire an Attorney for My Houston Car Accident, Personal Injury or Wrongful Death Claim?

I. We Always Offer Completely Free Consultations to Accident and Injury Victims. We Represent Personal Injury Clients on a Contingency Fee Basis. You Never Have to Pay Anything Out of Pocket, and We Only Get Paid if We Get You Compensation for Your Claim.

We  always offer completely free consultations for accident and injury victims, so if you’ve been injured in a car accident, truck accident, work accident, or lost a loved one in a situation involving a wrongful death, please contact us today to discuss how we may be able to help you with your legal claim.

We represent personal injury claimants on a contingency fee basis, and we advance any case expenses that are needed to move the case forward so that our clients who have suffered a personal injury do not have to pay any money out of pocket for our legal services and we only get paid if we are able to successfully obtain compensation for your claim.

We proudly represent accident and injury victims and their families, regular people from all backgrounds and walks of life who were injured through no fault of their own. When someone calls our office for assistance, it’s usually because they just went through something really bad, such as a  car accident resulting in injury, or they just experienced the single worst event of their entire life, such as a family member’s wrongful death.

Often, when a new client calls our office, they are still in shock, trying to process what they just went through and figure out how to begin dealing with the aftermath of the life-changing event they just experienced. As personal injury attorneys, we can never undo the difficult and often tragic events that caused our clients to reach out to us for assistance.

However, what we can do is use our skills, knowledge, and experience to zealously advocate for our clients and work diligently to get our clients the full and fair compensation they deserve.

We believe that everyone should have the opportunity to have top-tier legal representation when they are injured, regardless of their economic status, and we do our best to provide that to every client who trusts us to help them with their personal injury claim during their time of need.

II. What is a Contingency Fee and How is It Different From Other Attorney Billing Models?

a. What is a Contingency Fee?

A contingency fee is a form of payment to a lawyer for legal services where the lawyer receives a percentage of the money when they win or settle the case. This type of fee arrangement exists in other jurisdictions. For example, In England or Wales, this fee arrangement is referred to as a conditional fee.

b. What is a an Hourly Fee and How Much is the Average Attorney Hourly Rate in Texas?

In contrast to a contingency fee, most lawyers will charge an hourly fee, where a lawyer bills for various tasks performed based on time increments, usually in tenths of an hour, and a set hourly rate. Under this model, paralegals and support staff will often bill for their work as well at a lower hourly rate than the attorney.

According to a national survey of attorney billing rates conducted by Clio, a practice management software used by many law firms throughout the legal industry, the average hourly rate for lawyers in Texas is $300 dollars per hour, which is actually a slight decrease from the average 2022 rate of $313 dollars per hour and the 2021 average rate of $301 dollars per hour.

These amounts are consistent with the average hourly lawyer fees in Texas reflected in another survey conducted by LawPay, a legal payment software company used by many law firms nationwide to facilitate the payment of legal bills by clients. According to the LawPay survey, the average hourly rate for attorney services performed in Texas was $313 per hour in 2022 and $301 per hour in 2021.

The State Bar of Texas also periodically conducts surveys and issues reports on various matters and issue pertaining to attorneys who practice law in the State of Texas. The last/most recent State Bar of Texas Report on Attorney Income and Hourly Rates, published in 2019, found that the median hourly billing rate for Texas attorneys was $291 per hour based on 2019 data. Another survey conducted by the State Bar of Texas in 2019 found that the median paralegal billing rate was $123 per hour in 2019.

A Houston Chronicle article published in 2015 noted that at the time of publication, some of the partners and senior attorneys at the bigger law firms in Texas were charging their corporate clients at a rate of  S1,000 per hour.

c. What is a Flat Fee?

In contrast to a contingency fee or an hourly fee, a flat fee is a fee arrangement when a lawyer charges a set fee upfront for specific legal work. Most often this type of fee arrangement is used for simple or routine cases, such as drafting a will without significant assets or complications, an uncontested divorce, or resolving a traffic ticket.

III. Why Does a Contingency Fee Model Work Best for Clients Making a Personal Injury Claim?

a. The 800-pound Gorilla Problem

Most of the time, the obstacle preventing a personal injury claimant from getting the full and fair amount of compensation to which they are entitled is an insurance company or another large corporation worth billions of dollars. It is a true David vs. Goliath scenario. Insurance companies and other defendant businesses have nearly unlimited financial resources which they are willing to spend to pay an army of lawyers to do everything they can to avoid paying the injury victim compensation, or to try to reduce the amount of compensation as much as possible if they cannot avoid paying despite their best efforts.

Unfortunately, for many large corporations, especially insurance companies, this is simply part of their business model- to do everything they can to avoid paying injury victims the full and fair compensation they are owed under the law. Sometimes, they will even pay more to fight the claim than it would have cost to pay it, based on their cold calculation that this approach will discourage other injury victims from seeking compensation in future cases, which will in turn lead to higher profits for the insurance company or other defendant corporation.

Many accident and injury victims are regular working-class people whose injuries made them unable to continue working, making it hard enough to deal with the ever-increasing pile of bills without also adding attorney bills into the mix. However, even the injury victims who happen to be white-collar professionals, high earners, or have some wealth through other means cannot possibly compete in an attorney-fees arms race with an insurance company or corporate defendant, and it would be impossible for them to pay out-of-pocket for the legal services they need in relation to their personal injury claim.

This is why a contingency-fee arrangement is the best option in personal injury cases. It allows injury victims who could not otherwise afford to hire an attorney to get the legal services they need in order to recover the full and fair compensation they are owed under the law. Texas law understands this dynamic, and the Texas Supreme Court has articulated and endorsed it in its discussion of contingency fee attorney retainer agreements for personal injury cases.

b. A Contingency Fee Allows Injury Victims Who Cannot Afford an Attorney to Obtain Legal Services; The Attorney Gets Paid a Percentage of the Money they are Able to Recover for the Client

As acknowledged by the Texas Supreme Court, the primary purpose of a contingency fee contract is to give injury victims who cannot afford to pay an attorney out of pocket the opportunity to obtain the legal services they need by compensating the attorney with a percentage of the money an attorney is able to recover for their client. Hoover Slovacek, LLP v. Walton, 206 S.W.3d 557, 561 (Tex. 2006). If the attorney does not successfully recover money for their client, the attorney does not get paid. This means that an attorney representing clients on a contingency fee basis takes on significantly more risk than an attorney representing clients on an hourly or flat fee basis, where the attorney will get paid regardless of the outcome of the case. Because the attorney and the client share the risk in working together on a contingency fee basis, this creates a powerful incentive for the lawyer to work diligently and obtain the best possible result for their client.  Izen v. Laine, 614 S.W.3d 775, 784 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2020, pets. denied);Hoover Slovacek, LLP v. Walton, 206 S.W.3d 557, 561 (Tex. 2006).

c. A Contingency Fee Agreement Aligns the Interests of the Client and the Attorney by Allowing them to Share the Risks of the Case, Incentivizing the Attorney to Get the Best Result Possible

As stated by the Texas Supreme Court and Fourteenth Court of Appeals, in addition to providing a way for personal injury claimants to afford legal services which they could not pay for out of pocket, the contingency fee arrangement also aligns the interests of the attorney and the client in a way that other fee arrangements do not. All attorneys have an ethical duty to represent their clients’ interests to the best of their ability regardless of how the attorney is being paid for their services. However, the contingency fee arrangement is the only one where both the attorney and the client mutually share the risks of the case. The attorney and the client both need the case to be successful in order to be paid, whereas an attorney billing on an hourly or flat-fee basis will still be paid the same amount regardless of how the legal proceeding turns out.

While this risk-sharing feature of the contingency fee agreement serves as a powerful force to align the interests of the client and the attorney, this dynamic is enhanced by the fact that the attorney’s salary is directly related to the recovery they are able to obtain for the client. Because a contingency fee is based on the percentage of the amount recovered, the more the attorney is able to recover for their client, the more money the attorney is paid for their work on the case. The risk-sharing and rewards-sharing features of the contingency fee agreement are both powerful motivators that align the interests of the attorney and the personal injury client in a way that is unique to the contingency fee model and does not exist in other types of fee arrangements.

IV. What are the Requirements for a Contingency Fee Agreement to Hire an Attorney According to Texas Law?

 A Contingency Fee Agreement Has to Be in Writing and Cannot be Unconscionable.

It is always best practice to have any agreement be in writing, including any agreement between a client and an attorney where the attorney is hired to perform legal services of any kind. However, Texas law specifically requires that contingency fee agreements hiring a lawyer be in writing. Texas Disciplinary Rule of Professional Conduct 1.04 (d) states in relevant part: “A contingent fee agreement shall be in writing and shall state the method by which the fee is to be determined. If there is to be a differentiation in the percentage or percentages that shall accrue to the lawyer in the event of settlement, trial or appeal, the percentage for each shall be stated.

Additionally, if any litigation expenses which are advance by the attorney to prosecute the lawsuit are reimbursed from a successful recovery of money for the claim, Texas Disciplinary Rule of Professional Conduct 1.04 (d)  requires these details to be clearly spelled out in the written contract, including whether the percentage fee is calculated from the amount of recovery before or after the reimbursable case expenses are deducted.

Furthermore, Texas Disciplinary Rule of Professional Conduct 1.04 (d) requires that the attorney representing a client in a contingency fee arrangement provide a written statement describing the outcome of the matter and providing an accounting of the amounts recovered, the portion being received by the client, and the calculations used to determine the client portion of the recovery in relation to the total amount recovered.

Finally, contingency fee agreements cannot be unconscionable. An “unconscionable” fee is one that no competent lawyer could view as being reasonable.  Hoover Slovacek, LLP v. Walton, 206 S.W.3d 557, 561 n.7 (Tex. 2006). Texas Disciplinary Rule of Professional Conduct 1.04 (b) also lists some of the non-exclusive factors to be considered in determining whether a fee is unconscionable.

V. If You Need an Attorney for a Houston Car Accident, Personal Injury or Wrongful Death Claim, Contact Our Office for a Free Consultation. If We Take On Your Case, We Will Represent You on a Contingency Fee Basis, and You Will Not Owe Any Money Unless We Successfully Recover Compensation for You.

Texas personal injury law is complicated. if you’ve been injured in a  car accident, truck accident, work accident, or lost a loved one in a situation involving a wrongful death, it’s important to have the right attorneys by your side to help you navigate the complexities of the legal system and work to obtain justice and receive full and fair compensation for your damages.

Our experienced personal injury lawyers at The Kishinevsky Law Firm have helped injured clients in the greater Houston area and throughout the State of Texas to successfully obtain full and fair compensation for their damages. If you’ve been injured due to someone else’s fault, contact our office today to schedule a free consultation to discuss your situation and find out how we may be able to help you to receive full and fair compensation for your claim.