Real Estate Agency Advertising Legal Services
Annotate this Case 94 N.J.L.J. 303
April 22, 1971
Appointed by the New Jersey Supreme Court
OPINION 5
Real Estate Agency Advertising Legal Services
The complaint stems from a printed newspaper advertisement addressed to "LANDLORDS - APARTMENT OWNERS." A licensed real estate broker states, "WE PROVIDE ... LEGAL SERVICES; all leases prepared, eviction notices served, collection of delinquent rents, and appearances in court for you when necessary."
This advertisement offers the performance of legal services by one not authorized to practice law:
"The drawing of legal instruments ... for others ... is clearly within traditional definition of the practice of law ..." N.J. State Bar Ass'n vs. Northern N.J. Mortgage Associates, 32 N.J. 430, 444 (1960).
Our Committee recently held that the solicitation through advertisement by a layman for the sale of a will form constituted the unauthorized practice of law. Similarly, it would appear that an advertisement offering to prepare all leases and the performance of the other services set forth in this advertisement as specified above, would constitute an unauthorized practice of law. Such services would require the exercise of judgment in the proper drafting of legal instruments, or even the selecting of the proper form of instrument, and it has been held "that persons providing such services be licensed members of the legal profession." Cape May County Bar Association vs. Ludlam, 45 N.J. 121, 126 (1965).
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