How much does a U.S. immigration lawyer cost?

Hourly rate – Immigration lawyers usually charge $100 to $600 per hour. It usually comes with consultation or immigration court proceedings, for example: removal proceedings. Because it is too hard to predict the total cost and lawyer’s time, when dealing with a litigation in court.

Flat rate – Attorneys are more likely to offer fixed fees if the cases are clearly defined and easy to predict the processing times. Usually, immigration lawyers would offer flat fees for most immigration cases, such as: lawyers may charge around $2,000 for a family based immigrant petition, around $1,500 for a change of status case, work visas could cost between $2,500 to $8,000 depending on the visa type and its circumstance, and asylum petitions may cost $8,000 or more.

In most of the cases, all the fees are nonrefundable. The fees are paid to an Attorney to prepare and file a solid application/petition on behalf of the client, but not to guarantee that the application/petition will be approved. However, at Skylex, we are offering a one time free filing for each denied case. We will find another attorney for you to redo the case for 0 legal fee.

Consultation – Clients usually have an initial consultation with the immigration lawyer, before the lawyer engaged in the application/petition. A consultation may cost between $150 to $400 per hour, and it always can be deducted if the client decides to let the lawyer represent the case.

However, there is no uniform fee for immigration lawyers in the United States. Even for the same case, attorney fees may vary. The law stipulates that attorney fees are reasonable as long as the parties reach an agreement. To determine whether U.S. immigration attorney fees are reasonable, the following factors should generally be considered:

Service Scope
The more services a lawyer provides, the higher the cost. Please note, lawyers may charge additional fees separately in further services if it is apart from the original service.

Difficulty of the case
Even if the scope of services is the same, attorney fees would depend on the difficulty of the case. For example, if the beneficiary has a record of denial in the past, the immigration petition will be more difficult, the lawyer needs to spend more time and effort. Then, the legal fee may be higher than a regular case.

(Each application/petition includes a government filing fee and an attorney fee)