1 /5 Lydia Staiger: I used Jon Albanese for the closing of a house I was selling. The one good thing I can say is that his paralegal, Kate, was responsive to my emails, but I never once spoke with Jon.
In fact, I had an issue arise at closing where the buyers were asking for a concession which I indicated I disagreed with, and I never heard from my attorney. As far as I know, he did nothing to defend me, and so I was forced into a concession which it seems I shouldn’t have actually been responsible for. I think they just wanted the closing to be done.
Additionally, I needed a POA to sign for the closing, and I presented one to the attorney which they informed me would not work for signing the deed specifically (but worked for everything else?). They had me sign another POA then ultimately charged me $200 for it which I certainly never agreed to. Considering the fact that you can print these out online and fill them out yourself, this seems outrageous. There was also a surprise “overnight fee” of $90 that I was charged at closing to “send the payoff.” From what I understand, this is not typical.
If you have a straightforward closing and don’t want to speak with your attorney, I suppose Jon would work well for you, otherwise I would recommend finding someone else to represent you.
