3 www.loubar.org March 2024 PRESIDENT’S PAGE Bryan R. Armstrong LBA President “ I love the practice of law – it feels great to help people. And its unpredictability is part of what makes it such a great ride. As of the writing of this article I have $30.16 in checking. Bills are filling up the inbox and spring break is on the horizon. When I first opened my solo practice in 2011, this would have terrified me. Now, meh; no big deal. I love being a solo practitioner. I can turn down any case I want, set my own rates, practice however I want and set my own hours. However, the economic life of a solo practitioner can be a wild ride. I’d be lying if I said I went to law school to help people. Sure, I’m proud I do now. But when I applied, law school was a path to a nice car, skiing and frequent beach trips. In law school, I grew interested in torts, specifically medical malpractice. As the son of a physician, I was convinced there was a scourge of frivolous medical malpractice suits. I was determined to help defend these defenseless doctors. Medical malpractice defense is how I started practicing law. Then I realized the same doctors and institutions became defendants again and again. I saw plaintiff’s lawyers putting up ridiculous sums of their own money to prosecute these cases. Frivolous medical malpractice suits, in my experience, just weren’t the issue. They cost too much to prosecute and the risk of loss is too great. From recollection, a few years ago, Shannon Ragland’s Kentucky Trial Court Report revealed only about an 18% success rate for plaintiffs at trial. From a basic economic perspective, plaintiff’s lawyers would have to scale to be successful. You’d have to file ten to win 1.8 of those ten cases; legal venture capital investing. And the costs… I digress… Later in my career I quit that firm in the middle of the 2008 crash to move to Connecticut. Cocksure, I was certain the largest economic downturn of my generation would leave me unscathed. What was I thinking? I retuned home with less than $100 to my name, in a U-haul, having sold my car and moved in with my mother. Argh. I believe I’m resilient. But were it not for the graciousness of Mike O’Connell allowing me to serve as an Assistant County Attorney in the Juvenile Division, I would’ve spent a year working in one of many Keep Louisville Weird businesses. Great experience, but I’m not built for criminal work. From there, I found an insurance defense firm. It didn’t take long to despise that my work made money for someone else. I quit to keep the fruits of my own labor. I do get to keep 100% off my success. But practice as a solo practitioner isn’t exactly working when you want and cashing checks. I eat 100% of my losses too. To be clear, that’s my money – gone. There’s malpractice insurance, experts, office rent, an array of office supplies, advertising, case expenses. It costs a lot of money to run a law practice, and revenue is irregular. In contingency practice I don’t get paid unless a case settled, and those checks don’t necessarily come every two weeks. That uncertainty is stressful. Quickly I learned something that many of my colleagues only theoretically understand; there are two ways to get a rocket to space: 1) a bigger rocket and 2) lighter fuselage. Everyone forgets the second. I strive to keep expenses down by foregoing an assistant, case management software and subleasing my office. I request my own medical records, negotiate my own subroga- tion liens and lick my own stamps. The goal is simple: more money in than out. Knowing of ‘dry periods’ where settlement checks are not always around the corner, I prepay anything I can. I avoid debt at all costs, I paid for my car in cash, I prepay mortgage months in advance, I maintain savings reserves. This isn’t something I was able to do early in practice. It took years of disciplined spending and saving. My splurges on larger settlements were typically limited to an IBC Root Beer (seriously) or a dinner. With $30.16 in checking, I prepaid the family spring break trip months ago and I’m set with mortgage. You never know what the future holds. I love the practice of law – it feels great to help people. And its unpredictability is part of what makes it such a great ride. The Predictable Unpredictability of Solo Practice