Coral Springs General Counsel

A Coral Springs business that waits for a dispute to arrive before it hires a lawyer is already playing from behind. Broward County is covered by the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, and by the time a contract fight, a partner conflict, or a lease default reaches a courtroom there, the paper trail that decides it was written months or years earlier, by people who were not thinking about litigation. The Andrew M. Schwartz Legal Team provides outside Coral Springs general counsel services to business owners, investors, and family companies in Coral Springs and across Broward and Palm Beach Counties, combining day-to-day legal support with a litigator’s eye for how documents hold up under pressure.

Outside general counsel is different from calling a lawyer when something breaks. It means a standing relationship with an attorney who knows your company, your owners, your contracts, and your risks, and who can answer a question on Tuesday that would otherwise cost you a lawsuit in the spring. Our firm serves as the company’s registered agent through its general counsel program and helps with the contract, compliance, and operational questions that come up in the ordinary course of doing business.

Most small and mid-sized companies cannot justify a full-time in-house lawyer. They also cannot afford to run on handshake deals, recycled templates, and operating agreements that nobody has read since formation. Outside counsel fills that gap, and because our attorneys spend their time in litigation, the advice we give is shaped by what actually goes wrong between co-owners, vendors, tenants, and customers.

Why Choose the Andrew M. Schwartz Legal Team as Your Outside General Counsel

The Andrew M. Schwartz Legal Team represents business owners, investors, and families in South Florida’s most difficult business and real estate disputes, serving Coral Springs, Boca Raton, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, and the rest of Broward and Palm Beach Counties. Schwartz has spent 37 years in litigation, with a career built around complex contract disputes, business divorces, and conflicts between partners, LLC members, and shareholders. He was admitted to The Florida Bar in 1989, earned his undergraduate degree from Emory University in 1986, and his law degree from the University of Miami in 1989.

Senior Counsel Sundeep Nath, a Northwestern-trained litigator, works alongside him with years of experience handling business and real estate cases in state and federal courts. That litigation background is the point of hiring us as general counsel. A lawyer who has seen how ownership disputes unfold can tell you, before you sign, which clause in an operating agreement will become the battleground and which lease term will cost you in a default.

The firm practices as a true legal team, so everyone working on your matter knows the file and can respond when you call. We keep a strict 24 hour return call policy when we are in court or unable to pick up, and we schedule conference calls at times that work for everyone involved. Our attorneys are experienced in mediation and arbitration as well as courtroom litigation, and we look for the resolution that serves your goals and budget rather than stretching a dispute out for its own sake.

The firm also has a record at trial. After a five-day bench trial in Broward County Circuit Court, the court issued a 32-page final judgment awarding our client specific performance of a commercial real estate contract. When a general counsel relationship does end up in court, that is the level of preparation behind it.

What Outside General Counsel Covers for a Coral Springs Business

• Registered Agent Services: Our general counsel program lets the firm serve as the company’s registered agent, so legal notices and service of process reach a lawyer who can read them and act, instead of landing in an unopened pile.
• Contract Drafting and Review: Vendor agreements, customer contracts, purchase agreements, and commercial leases are reviewed before signing, with attention to the exact wording that courts later enforce.
• Operating and Shareholder Agreements: Buyout triggers, deadlock provisions, valuation methods, and expulsion or dissociation terms are far cheaper to negotiate on good days than to fight over on bad ones.
• Compliance and Operational Questions: Day-to-day questions about how to handle a departing partner, a late-paying customer, or a regulatory notice get answered by someone who already knows your file.
• Commercial Real Estate Matters: Purchase and sale contracts, failed closings, leases, and landlord and tenant issues are part of our real estate practice and often intertwine with business ownership.
• Family Business Planning: Siblings, parents and children, and in-laws who share ownership face questions about control, compensation, and succession that are best settled in writing and handled with discretion.
• Dispute Triage: When a disagreement starts, we assess whether negotiation, mediation, arbitration, or an emergency injunction is the right tool, often keeping a dispute from becoming a lawsuit.
• Collections and Money Problems: Unpaid invoices, unpaid distributions, and company funds that cannot be accounted for can be addressed early, before assets are moved or spent.

Acting Before a Dispute Starts: Practical Steps for Coral Springs Owners

The most useful thing a business owner can do is pull every governing document into one place: articles of organization or incorporation, the operating or shareholder agreement, major contracts, leases, loan documents, and any amendments. If a document was never signed, or a deal exists only in emails and texts, that is the first gap to close. Courts decide contract fights on the wording and on the parties’ history of dealing with one another, so informal practices that contradict the paper deserve attention now.

Know the deadlines that apply if something goes wrong. A claim on a written contract generally must be filed within five years, while an oral or implied contract claim has four years. A fraud claim runs four years from discovery, capped at twelve years overall. Rescission has a four-year period, and an action for specific performance has just one year, which surprises many people. Professional malpractice claims have a two-year period measured from when the problem was or should have been discovered. Because these clocks differ so much by claim type, a delay of even a few months can change your options.

Know which court is likely to hear a case. Disputes in Coral Springs are filed in Broward County, where the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit sits. Circuit court handles claims above the county court ceiling, which is periodically adjusted, while county court hears mid-sized claims and small claims court handles the smallest. Broward’s courts also include a complex business division that handles matters such as the dissolution of certain business entities and large business and construction litigation. Federal cases involving Broward County go to the Southern District of Florida, which holds court in Fort Lauderdale. If your business or property also touches Palm Beach County, that county falls under the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit.

Avoid the common mistakes. Do not move money out of a disputed account or cut a partner out of information on your own; those steps often become the basis of a fiduciary duty claim against you. Do not sign a new agreement or a release without reading how it changes your existing rights. Do not assume that a long friendship or family tie replaces a written agreement. And do not wait until a lawsuit is served to call counsel, because by then the options for a negotiated outcome have usually narrowed.

When a Partner Dispute Reaches Dissolution: What Florida Law Allows

General counsel relationships sometimes turn into dispute work when owners can no longer work together, and it helps to know the legal framework early. Under Florida’s LLC statute, a member or manager may ask a circuit court to dissolve the company on several grounds: the company’s activities are being conducted unlawfully; it is not reasonably practicable to run the business in line with the articles and operating agreement; controlling managers or members are acting or are expected to act illegally or fraudulently; assets are being misappropriated or wasted to the company’s injury; or the managers or members are deadlocked and irreparable injury to the company is threatened or occurring.

Dissolution is not the only outcome. In an LLC proceeding the court may appoint a receiver or custodian after a hearing with notice to the parties, or order a purchase of the petitioning member’s interest. If the operating agreement contains a deadlock sale provision and someone invokes it before the court finds deadlock grounds, that contractual mechanism generally takes the place of a judicial dissolution order. This is exactly why a well-drafted agreement matters: it can give owners a private exit path instead of a public lawsuit.

Corporations follow a parallel but distinct statute. A shareholder may seek judicial dissolution on statutory grounds, including a corporation that has abandoned its business and failed to liquidate within a reasonable time. Once a shareholder files, the corporation, or if it does not act, one or more other shareholders, may elect to purchase the petitioner’s shares at fair value. If the parties agree on value and terms within 60 days after the first election is filed, the court enters an order directing the purchase, and the election is irrevocable unless the court finds it equitable to modify it. The corporation must also notify the other shareholders within 30 days of filing that they can avoid dissolution by buying out the petitioner. During the case, the court can issue injunctions, appoint a receiver or custodian, and take steps to preserve corporate assets.

When co-owners hold real estate rather than a company, the remedy is often partition. All partition actions in Florida are brought in chancery, and the court may divide the property or, if division would prejudice the owners, order a sale at public auction with proceeds shared in proportion to ownership. Heirs property, meaning land held in tenancy in common where at least some interests came from relatives, is subject to a separate statutory framework with added protections for the cotenants.

Questions Coral Springs Business Owners Ask About General Counsel

What does outside general counsel actually do?

Outside general counsel acts as your company’s standing legal advisor without the cost of an in-house employee. That includes reviewing contracts, answering operational and compliance questions, advising on owner relationships, and serving as registered agent. Because the lawyer knows your business in advance, advice is faster and better informed than a first-time consultation during a crisis.

Is outside general counsel only for large companies?

No. It is often most valuable for small and mid-sized businesses and family companies that have real legal exposure but cannot justify a full-time lawyer. A company with a handful of owners, a commercial lease, and a few key contracts can benefit from regular access to counsel.

What does it mean for a law firm to serve as registered agent?

The registered agent is the party designated to receive legal notices and service of process on the company’s behalf. When our firm serves in that role through the general counsel program, anything served on the company reaches attorneys who can respond promptly instead of sitting unnoticed.

How can general counsel prevent a partnership dispute?

Many partner conflicts grow out of vague agreements: unclear capital contributions, no buyout formula, no process for deadlock. A lawyer reviewing and updating those terms while owners still get along can put a defined exit path in writing, which often keeps a disagreement from becoming a lawsuit.

Can you review an operating agreement I already signed?

Yes. We can review an existing operating or shareholder agreement, explain how its buyout, expulsion, deadlock, and dissociation provisions would likely work, and recommend amendments if the owners are willing to make them.

Does having general counsel mean I will end up in litigation?

The opposite is usually true. Having a litigator involved before a dispute starts often resolves the issue earlier through negotiation, mediation, or arbitration. When a case cannot be settled, the same attorneys already know the file if it goes to court.

How long do I have to sue over a breach of a written contract in Florida?

Five years for a claim founded on a written instrument, and four years for contract claims that are oral or implied. These periods were not changed by the 2023 reduction of the negligence deadline, which is now two years. Other claims, such as specific performance, have much shorter windows, so the type of claim matters.

Can a business partner take money out of the company without my approval?

It depends on your agreement and the nature of the transfer, but diverted funds, unpaid distributions, and commingled accounts can support claims for an accounting, breach of fiduciary duty, and recovery of the money. When assets are at risk of being moved, a court can issue emergency injunctive relief while the case is pending.

What happens if my co-owners and I are deadlocked and the agreement says nothing?

Florida law gives LLC members and managers the right to seek judicial dissolution when they are deadlocked and irreparable injury to the company is threatened or occurring, and the court can also appoint a receiver or order a buyout instead. For corporations, the shareholder buyout election gives the other owners a chance to purchase the petitioner’s shares at fair value and avoid dissolution.

I live in New York, New Jersey, or Connecticut. Can you handle my Florida business matter?

Yes. We regularly represent clients from the tri-state area who own businesses or real estate in South Florida. We handle the local court appearances and proceedings and keep you informed so you do not have to travel for every hearing.

Do you work with other attorneys on referral?

Yes. A significant part of our practice comes from other lawyers, including out of state attorneys whose clients have Florida disputes. We communicate with referring counsel throughout and respect their relationship with the client.

Serving Coral Springs and Broward County Businesses Across South Florida

Our general counsel clients in Coral Springs are in good company across Broward County, and we regularly work with owners in neighboring Parkland, Margate, Tamarac, Coconut Creek, and Pompano Beach. From there the work extends south and east through Plantation, Sunrise, Fort Lauderdale, Davie, Weston, Pembroke Pines, and Hollywood, and into Deerfield Beach and Lighthouse Point along the northern Broward coast.

To the north, the firm serves businesses and property owners throughout Palm Beach County, including Boca Raton, Delray Beach, Boynton Beach, Lake Worth, Wellington, Palm Beach Gardens, Jupiter, and West Palm Beach. We also represent clients in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut whose partners, co-owners, or properties are here in South Florida.

Talk With a Coral Springs General Counsel Attorney

If your business needs a lawyer who understands how disputes begin before they become lawsuits, a Coral Springs general counsel attorney at the Andrew M. Schwartz Legal Team can walk through your agreements, your owners, and your exposure and tell you where you stand. Call to schedule a consultation and put a litigator’s judgment behind your company before the next problem arrives.