Garwood Family Law & Mediation

Divorce is a life-​changing event. I often felt like a foreigner where I did not speak the language. I needed someone who was experienced, who could help me navigate the unknown and could settle my case. Julia was recommended to me by someone who went through an equally arduous divorce. Julia and her staff were capable of handling everything in my case – from the simplest to the most contentious. It was my experience that Julia initially tried to settle case but my ex husband kept taking unreasonable positions that were contrary to law. Nothing got past Julia. She maintained a high degree of ethics, which was very important to me considering my ex’s attorney was spending his money like there was an endless well he could draw from. Julia addressed this issue, amongst many in court, and I stood next to her, very appreciative to have such a great advocate on my side. Julia plays it cool in court, until it counts – switching into a highly aggressive advocate when needed. Our case prevailed, and Julia’s firm helped me put the awful litigation in the past and move forward. She also was able to get my ex to pay attorney fees, which was very important in my case. I would highly recommend Julia Garwood and her firm.

Before i hired Julia Garwood and her staff, I did my research first, and I came across that Julia has a very extensive knowledge in the family law practice, so I did hired Julia for my child custody case and Jeniffer Pierce. Julia, mostly worked on my entire case and I am very pleased with the out come. Thank you Rebekah for always taking my calls and responding to my questions. I won the case, I have a greater percentage with my children than the father has. Julia knows the family law very good. I was very impressed the day of my last child custody court hearing, that I felt Julia was more knowledgeable than the judge. Thank you Julia Garwood and staff. My children and I are very happy!
Thank you!

I have personally met the entire staff of Garwood Family Law and found them to be highly competent as well as friendly. I personally used them for some legal advice and was impressed by their timely response. I would recommend Garwood Family Law to anyone!

I went to the Garwood Family Law for legal assistance with a family matter, Ms. Garwood and her team were amazingly responsive and met each and every one of my needs. I would choose them again and refer my friends and family whenever possible.

On Wednesday, January 29, 2014, I had an appointment with Julia Garwood, for a phone consultation at 2:00 p.m. I called her at the appointment time and was told that she was not in the office. The receptionist explained that the attorney would call me back on her cell phone later that same day. Because I understand mistakes do happen, I thought I should be reasonable and give her the chance to see if she actually called me later that day as promised. To date, I still have not received a phone call from the listed attorney. Due to me not being happy with this firm I thought I would send them an email as a common courtesy to let them know that I planned to leave negative reviews for them online (so they wouldn’t feel blindsided), but I did so in a very polite way in hopes they may want to reach out to me and make things right. After all, I am a potential client and I would hope customer service would be important to them. After sending the firm the email I did finally receive a phone call back, but it was not focused on customer service at all as I’d hoped. It would not at all have been hard for them to simply apologize and let us put this behind us and move forward. However, one of the paralegals, Larisa, without even a greeting proceeded to jump down my throat with a nasty tone which I found to be very unprofessional. She told me she did not appreciate the aggressive tone in the email I had sent them and was very sarcastic in her remarks saying, «there is such thing as human error, you know.» Julia, what kind of office are you running over there? I was surprised Larisa had said my email to them was aggressive because it was anything but. It had to be one of the most polite emails I had ever written someone and I made sure to not use a threatening tone in any way. When I hire an attorney I like to know they can be aggressive on my behalf, but after hearing that this firm considered my polite email to be aggressive that really makes me not want to hire them even more. I want an attorney to represent me who actually has an understanding of what «aggressive» means. On the phone call Larisa stated that the attorney did in fact make several attempts to call me and even left a voice message. I found that to be quite strange because I intentionally kept my phone on and waited for this phone call which never came, nor did the voice mail of course. I asked Larisa if she had checked with Julia regarding her attempts to call me prior to contacting me today and she said she had not because Julia was in court. So my question is… How could Larisa call me without first speaking to Julia to get her facts straight? Did she just assume Julia must have tried to call me? Larisa did not have an answer for that. The paralegal explained that errors happen and that the attorney may have called the wrong phone number? Really? So, Larisa… How did you just happen to find my correct phone number today so you could call me regarding the email I sent you? Is it just a coincidence you happened to find the correct number to contact me at but Julia could not? I find that hard to believe. Also, there were other hypothetical scenarios as well. I do feel that when a potential client sends an email to a professional office with a complaint the attorney herself should make time to contact that client. It was unfortunate that her paralegal called me instead because she lacked first hand knowledge of the facts. In addition, made matters worse. Julia Garwood, I wish your firm only the very best but I no longer have any desire to retain you.

My husband and I went to Garwood family Law to receive help in getting more custody of our daughter. Julia told us we would very likely get that. In their paperwork it says there are no guarantees but Julia told us it was very probable since it was such a simple case we had a very good chance. I called Julia and specifically told her we could not go one penny over $ 5000 for our case. She said that she would try to do that and would notify us if we went over. Well $ 15,000 later, We were not notified and we were charged for every call every email, we were charged when they even thought of us! This was so disappointing. We felt like we were taken advantage of, not communicated with about the billing and we did not end up with the outcome we wanted either. Not a good experience for us at all. Honestly we would have been better off to represent ourselves. So for anyone looking to hire this firm Warning … Extremely expensive and make sure you do not call too many times or if you do, just know you will be abundantly charged!

Garwood Family Law and Mediation
I highly recommend Julia Garwood to everyone. Julia has handled my divorce over the past 17 years. Mine has been a complex case and I am pleased with Julia’s work. Her compassion and understanding made believe that she took my case personally. Julia was there to guide and counsel; she truly took the time to help me reach decisions that will best address my concerns while helping me not get caught up in the emotional aspect of this process. Julia is a strong advocate of children — always keeping in mind what would be best for them.
I highly recommend this firm.

I consulted this lawyer on a family law matter. She had a phone call with opposing counsel, bought into the story that attorney presented, and then she told me she couldn’t help me and that I was probably going to lose custody of my child.
I went on to represent myself and won the case outright at virtually every turn. I was shocked that Julia would be so shallow as to assume what opposing counsel told her about the case was true, and she caused me a lot of stress by implying I had a weak case, which turned out not to be correct.