How long does it take to settle a personal injury case or get it to trial?
Clients often want to know when they can expect to set their settlement/judgment. It is impossible to tell at the outset of a case how long it will take to settle, however, generally, the higher the damages, the harder the insurance company will fight before paying out a settlement. For smaller cases, it is cheaper for the insurance company to pay a small settlement just to be rid of the case than to have their attorney work the file for $200 per hour. For cases involving higher damages, there is usually a long discovery process involving depositions of all parties and witness, all doctors that have treated the client both before and after the accident, and all expert witnesses. Ideally, personal injury cases should not settle or be tried until the client has reached maximum medical improvement because you don’t want to accept a settlement check and then find out that you need surgery that costs $50,000.00. Some cases settle right away, others can take years. It depends on the facts of
