How I accidently bought Personal Property Dispute Attorney Leads, and what I’ve learned from them so far.

As you know I am an Attorney, adn to grow my business I someones buy leads. What I recently did, was buy some leads, and I guess I didn’t pay enough attention, and bought Attorney Leads for “property disputes” thinking in my mind that would be mostly be leads for people seeking Real Estate Attorneys. Boy, was I wrong, it actually was the category for people who needed an Attorney to help they with personal property disputes. That was not what I was expecting, but I’ma good sport and I decided to work the leads and see what kinod help people seeking a Personal Property Dispute Attorney needed.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #1: A contractor did some backyard work on real property (planted trees, cement work etc) and allegedly covered the yard’s drains. Allegedly as a result of rain, the backyard was flooded. Prospective client called the home improvement contractor back to fix it, and the home improvement contractor jerks them around, allegedly promising to come back, and yet never show up. Six months pass, and this particular consumer is ready to talk to an Attorney who will sue the home improvement contractor. So basically, contractor negligence, with consequential damages from floods. Not too far from what i was looking for. I am an Attorney who deals with home improvement contracts and disputes arising from them. So, a legitimate lead, that would be miscategorized. I will not complaint. However, its not really a real estate case, its a contractor negligence case, and I presume the client would want an attorney to work on contingency. I contacted them, but they claimed to have hired an attorney already, do I didn’t pry. However, it is the type of case I would take, if the facts were good.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #2: in this particular case lead, the Prospective client was stingy with information, which to me as an Attorney, I consider a red flag. The information they did give, was that someone had hit their car, which makes perfect sense as a Personal Property Damage case lead. However even though I called them and left messages, and texts, and emails, they did not response, so I moved on, because no Attorney wants a flaky client who doesn’t return phone calls. However, I open representing clients who who car related personal property damage claims, but from a lead purchase perspective, not a attorney real estate disp[ute case.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #3: in this particular case lead, the Prospective client was also stingy with information, which to me as an Attorney, I consider a red flag. The information they did give, was the single word “default”. Every Attorney’s dream of concise information in the lead description. Not even sure its a Personal Property Damage case lead. However, I was able to reach this one, and they had an active real estate case in the County Superior Court, but they had allowed a default to be taken against them. So, not a personal dispute but in reality at real estate dispute, so AI was kind of happy, because I am Real Estate Attorney, but the case not a happy ending, because i was willing to represent them in a motion to set aside default, the client ghosted as soon as they were expect to pay for a motion to set aside default. So… bad client, good lead, by accident, because it was miscategorized (though to my advantage. However, I am still available to help the client file the motion to set aide the default, as soon as they realize that Real Estate Attorneys do not work for free.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #4: Prospective Client States: “Negligent/Fraudulent/Misrepresented Housing Documents received from Seller and Real estate agent on Condo Sale”. Interesting, basically a real estate lack of disclosure case, with damages arising from needed roof repairs and some issue with asbestos allegedly not discovered by home inspector. And a bad water heater. So its kind of a mixed bad. Real Estate dispute with Personal Property Issues arising from the allegedly negligence home inspector. A reasonable lead, but the prospective client decided not to go forward for reason of their own. As a real estate Attorney, this is the kind of case I would take though I would generally prefer to represent the seller not they buyer. That said, as an Attorney, I have at one point or another represented every potential party in a transaction like this in court.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #5: Another car case. Another driver crashed into a parked car, and now the owner of the car that was being driven is now screwing around with payi8ng for damages. Unfortunately for me as an Attorney, the damages are very low, like small claims low, so no case for me. While I could help, the clients don’t want to pay to help, and so its a loss for me. However, if you had a similar situation but with real large damages, then its the kind of case I would take. If it was a smashed luxury car or truck an $20-30K in damages, different story. I would be willing to be a personal property dispute attorney for that.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #6; This was a dog bites dog while being kept at an unlicensed dog sitters house. That is different. Low damages, so bad case4, but the unlicense sitter made the right decision to pay the vet bill, so I can’t hate them. Dog owner thinks their dog as PTSD from the situation, I think that is a stretch, but not sure how you bring a emotional distress claim on behalf of a dog. That said, a very valuable dog with very extensive vet bills, maybe that is worth doing. Or if what a dog bite person case, might be better. If the dog sitter had not paid for vet bill, I would have suggested small claims court. In theory there might be other consumer torts, but philosophically, I don’t try to make something out of nothing as a plaintiff’s attorney. Lots of frustrating litigation comes out of that. However, if you have a dog related case with real damages I’m open to it.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #7 Another Car case, this time involving a hit and run driver. No medical bills. So low damages, another case that belongs in small claims court. Prospective client did not warm my heart, so I didn’t go into details with him. Again, it is about the damages. If the case is too small, it doesn’t make much sense for an attorney to get involved. In this case, I offered to help fill out the small claims court papers for a small fee, and the prospective client wouldn’t pay my fee be credit card, upfront, but wanted to meet in person to discuss it. So I figured, this was going to be a waste of time. Attorney don’t have time to give free consults for tiny projects.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #8. Another car case, this time the car was damaged at car mechanics shop by one of the mechanics employees. The shop owner allegedly refuses to given insurance policy, and allegedly insists that the prospective client use a particular repair shop, apparently friendly or affiliated with the mechanic shop owner. This sounds like an episode of The Sopranos. Apparently, Mechanic shop has offered to cut a check, but victim thinks its too low.. The empathy, the humanity, the drama. However, even though I called them and left messages, and texts, and emails, they did not response, so I moved on, because no Attorney wants a flaky client who doesn’t return phone calls. That said, I think I would have liked this case on it facts.. Depends on the repair costs of course, and how much the difference in the offer and the desired outcome would be. I’m guessing the victim wants a contingency attorney, so, it would have to be really significant damages for me to want to take it as a Plaintiff’s Contingency Attorney.

Personal Property Dispute Lead #9 This one involved on neighbor excessively cutting and trimming and allegedly damaging another neighbors tree. Lead wanted free advice over the phone on how to fill out the forms and got butt hurt when I expected to paid for doing that. Kind of a wobbler. Neighbor disputes are kind of like real estate disputes, but the subject of the lawsuit is the tree , which I think is personal property., So issues with reducing landscaping value, etc. It would not be my first neighbor dispute as a real estate attorney, but the client is stingy with the willingness to pay attorney’s fees, so I big hard pass, and big hard loss of time and money for me.

As a Real; Estate Attorney, I suspected that Property Dispute would generate Clients looking for Real Estate Attorneys. And I wasn’t completely wrong. 4 of the 95 leads were kind of related to clients looking for a Real Estate Attorney. But I should have realized that their would be a large number of Property Dispute Attorney Leads that would not be Clients looking for Real Estate Attorneys. What I did find interesting is the number of clients looking for car-related property damage attorneys. So what I’m speculating is that without a personal injury component to a car accident, there are not too many attorneys taking car damage recovery cases. The Dog Bite Dog case seems like a outlier. I suspect if I keep taking the leads from this provider, then it will be split 50/50 between wobbler real estate cases and car damage cases. Which would make a lot of sens3e to me.

The practical lesson though, is that many of these case are very low damage, which makers them bad cases to take on contingency, and the prospective clients are very cheap and stingy when it comes to paying attorney’s fees. And of course that is frustrating. On the other hand, is it just a numbers game, do we have to process a certain number of weak leads to get a reasonable number of paying clients who want to hire a real estate attorney. Time will tell.

So decision time, do I keep fishing in this pond or do I focus somewhere else?

If yes, I can help. i handle personal property disputes, and while I have standards for the types of cases I take, I am open for your business. Let me know what you need done? I am an Attorney located in Moreno Valley.