A general practice, kept deliberately practical
Business organization and transactions, commercial and residential real estate, Section 1031 tax deferred exchanges, estate planning, guardianships, probate and estate administration, and family law mediation. Many clients arrive for one of these and come back years later for another.
Most of what goes wrong is a step nobody mentioned.
An exchange set up after the sale instead of before it. A lease signed with a personal guarantee in it. A trust created and never funded. An estate distributed in the wrong order. None of those are difficult problems while there is still time to fix them, and all of them are expensive afterward. The seven areas below exist because that pattern repeats, and the eighth reason to call is simply that you are not sure which one you are in.
Business
Organizing a company properly, papering who owns what, and putting the contracts you send customers in front of an attorney once so you can send them a thousand times.
Business law
Most of what a business attorney does is unglamorous and cheap compared with what it prevents. An operating agreement written while everyone still likes each other is an afternoon. Written afterward, it is litigation.
Commercial real estate
A commercial deal is a legal document sitting on top of a building, a loan and a title history. The document is the part people read. The other three are where the money usually goes.
Section 1031 exchanges
A like kind exchange lets gain on an investment property be deferred rather than recognized at the sale. It works only if it is set up before the sale, and it runs on a clock that does not negotiate.
Property
Buying and selling, on both sides and at both scales. In a general practice this is the busiest group by volume and the one most likely to overlap with the other two.
Family and estates
What happens to what you own, who decides for you if you cannot, and the matters that arrive after a death or during a separation.
Estate planning
Estate planning is deciding who receives what, who decides for you if you cannot, and how much of it has to pass through a courtroom. Most of it is simpler than people fear.
Probate and estate administration
Probate is administration, not conflict, most of the time. Somebody has to be authorised to act, the assets have to be gathered, the debts have to be dealt with, and the rest has to reach the right people.
Family law mediation
Mediation is the part of family law where the two people who know the most about the situation get to decide it, instead of a judge who is meeting them for the first time.
The areas are not really separate
A company that signs a commercial lease is asking a business law question with a property answer. An owner selling an investment building is one week away from a Section 1031 exchange that only works if it is set up first. And an estate plan is mostly a set of decisions about how a house is titled, which is a deed rather than a will.
That is the practical case for one firm holding all of it rather than three firms holding a third each. You can read about who would be handling it, see who the firm works for, or go straight to scheduling a consultation.
Questions before you call
Why a general practice instead of a specialism?
Because in a county of this size the same client keeps coming back with a different problem. A business buys a building, the building ends up in an estate, the estate raises a family question. Splitting that across three firms means paying three sets of lawyers to learn the same facts.
What does the firm not handle?
Criminal defense, immigration, personal injury and bankruptcy are outside the practice. If you call about one of those you will be told on the first call, not in month three, and pointed somewhere useful where that is possible.
Do these areas overlap?
Constantly, which is the argument for keeping them together. A commercial lease is a business question and a property question. An estate is usually a house. A family matter is often an argument about who keeps it.
How are fees set?
By the matter and the scope, which is why there are no prices printed here. You get a number before you engage the firm, and it goes into a written engagement.
Which courts does the firm appear in?
Most court work is in the Tippecanoe County courts. Keith Fafarman is admitted in all state and federal courts in Indiana and in the United States District Court for Arizona. Ask on the first call if your matter sits elsewhere.
I do not know which of these my problem is.
That is normal, and working it out is part of the first conversation and not something you are expected to do beforehand. Call 765-423-1001 and describe it in plain words.
Tell us what you are dealing with.
Describe it in order, with the dates. You will get a straight read on whether this needs an attorney, what the work involves, and where to start.
Contacting Gambs, Mucker & Bauman does not create an attorney-client relationship, and nothing on this site is legal advice. Please do not send confidential information until a written engagement is in place.