People We Know & Stories We Don’t: Moshe Newman

BUSINESS

Moshe Newman

People We Know & Stories We Don’t: MOSHE NEWMAN

DOVID NISSAN ROETTER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Southfield resident Moshe Newman began his entrepreneurial life when he was less than 10 years old. Newman had his first business then, selling flowers door-to-door in honor of the weekend’s upcoming Shabbat.

Not too long afterward, his great-grandfather passed away and left him and his siblings an inheritance. Newman invested his inheritance into a family member’s business.

As a kid, he was told constantly that his debating skills showed he would make a great lawyer. So, after yeshivah, Newman graduated with a bachelors in Talmudic law and then attended law school itself — a “natural progression.”

While most law students spend their summers interning, Newman spent his first summer getting married. His first child followed the next summer. He then escalated his classes and passed the bar, finishing college in two and a half years. He used his “spare time” to study various areas of law to find his niche.

His desire to help people caused him to to bypass working for a large corporation where “a client is just one on a list,” he said. Wanting the opportunity to provide a different level of service, Newman used the profits from his investment over a decade earlier to open his own practice. Thus, Legacy Law Firm, focused on elder law and probate litigation, opened in 2015 when Newman was in his late 20s. The firm started in practically “a broom closet” in his father’s office and has since grown to its current location on Greenfield Road in Southfield. He has two assistants and a paralegal to help him and their clients.

Legacy Law Firm was designed to help people in crisis and, more importantly, to avoid crisis. Many seniors do not plan their care properly or their children do not understand how to properly find care. “Peoples’ legacies are in their hands much more than people realize,” Newman said.

The firm helps people leave a legacy behind, whether it be a house or Social Security pensions, instead of it all going into nursing home costs. He prides himself that clients can call his cell phone personally, and that he can visit clients in the hospital directly to see the situation at hand for himself. While he hopes to expand the firm in the next few years, Newman desires to keep its “smallfirm vibe.”

He said he’s proud to wear his yarmulkah in the courtroom. “Overall, people have respected it,” he said.

However, being an Orthodox lawyer does have its challenges. Having to turn off his phone for Shabbat and Jewish holidays is difficult. He worked right up until Shavuot due to a case emergency and then started right back up the night the holiday ended.

Law school held similar challenges. He partnered with a Muslim classmate to exchange notes during each other’s religious holidays, and they worked to find each other places to pray between classes.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, his court cases have switched to Zoom, which he says has its ups and downs. While cases can be done from his office, Newman is unable to whisper with his clients as easily as when in the courthouse together.

However, clients from out of town can participate more actively in the case because of video conferencing. He hopes that once the pandemic dies down, the court system will keep a “hybrid” Zoom availability.

Newman runs the firm right in his hometown so he can give back to his community. It was not easy opening a law firm right out of law school, but Newman wanted to make a difference. Thankfully, his 10-year-old self was able to help, and his family supported the decision.

Moshe Newman can be reached at (248) 629-0161 or at mnewman@ thelegacyfirm.com or by visiting www. thelegacyfirm.com.