Does transactional work exist outside of biglaw? Forum

[KarlRemarks]

Hi all, I'm a 0l, considering a career in transactional law after burning out as a legal assistant in a litigation boutique. I've read that transactional work is rare outside of biglaw, and that it can be difficult to find if you don't attend a t14 school. How true is this? Do midlevel firms have a substantial transactional practice?

[crazywafflez]

It certainly exists and midlevel shops. I'm at a midsized firm in a small market. About 1/2 of our folks are transactional (excluding estate planning). Who else does Operating Agreements or SaaS stuff for smaller ma and pa places? Lots of real estate stuff to be had too at smaller shops as well.

[lawschoolftw]

Absolutely.

[Anonymous User]

Biglaw partner. While public M&A and certain types of finance/capital markets work don't really exist outside biglaw, many firms outside of biglaw have very robust transactional practices, and many handle matters that are quite sophisticated. Some are even better than biglaw at certain transactional practices; for example, I'd rather have Allen Matkins handle a real estate transaction than a generic V100 firm.

[SFSpartan]

Biglaw partner. While public M&A and certain types of finance/capital markets work don't really exist outside biglaw, many firms outside of biglaw have very robust transactional practices, and many handle matters that are quite sophisticated. Some are even better than biglaw at certain transactional practices; for example, I'd rather have Allen Matkins handle a real estate transaction than a generic V100 firm.

This. Will also add that for M&A, VC, etc. midlaw and small firms sometimes do very sophisticated, biglaw-quality work but often play towards the lower/earlier-stage end of the market. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that and that type of work can engender better WLB than working on mega-deals but the difference is something to be aware of.

[goatee87]

A lot of investment advisory work is done by small or mid-sized firms. Think fund formations, syndications, etc.

Also, non-tech M&A deals under $50 million