To the uninitiated, seeing the back and forth in the world of settlement negotiations can be emotionally draining. "How can they say that?" my client asks. "I knew it was a mistake to try to settle with them!"
I pointed out that this was a show; both sides are playing a glorified game of poker, in an effort to pull the other side up (if they're the plaintiff), or drive their settlement demand down (if they're the defendant).
When this particular breach of contract action began, the other side was pushing for the full freight of the (alleged) money owed - $110,000. There were significant problems with the plaintiff's case, however, including that there was a strong argument that the claim was brought beyond the statute of limitations (or, in plain English, "too late"), and service of the papers on one of my clients was, to be kind, highly questionable.
So, we moved to dismiss the complaint.
Although the Court (wrongly) denied our motion, even though the plaintiff's attorney huffed and puffed about what a strong case he had, he dropped his settlement demand to just over $21,000. My client read the plaintiff's attorney's bluster (I blind copied him on all correspondence to keep him firmly in the loop on the case), and was outraged, to the point that he was, in his own words, "shaking."
After some short back and forth, he agreed to accept $7,500 as a settlement, stating:
"You win. $7500 over 18 mos."
Why I Settled the Case
The reason why I urged my client to try to settle the case is really rather straightforward:
At this number, it was going to cost him less to resolve the case (with certainty and finality) than to continue litigating the case on the chance that the Court would ultimately agree with us, and dismiss the case later on.
In other words, this settlement was a "no brainer" from his perspective.
