Signed MVA retainers: what they cost, and when they beat buying leads.

What is a signed MVA retainer?

A signed MVA retainer is a motor vehicle accident case that arrives with the contingency-fee agreement already executed — the vendor's intake team qualified the claimant, explained representation, and captured the signature before handing the file over. They cost $1,500–$20,000+ per case against $585–$1,105 for a lead, and shift your risk from conversion to case selection: you no longer worry whether intake can sign, you worry whether the case was worth signing.

The industry also calls these signed MVA cases, pre-signed retainers, retained cases, or full retainer packages, and sells them under labels including pay-per-signed-case and performance-based case acquisition. Whatever the label, the product is the same: a motor vehicle accident file that arrives past the intake stage, usually bundled with a medical authorisation, a representation letter, and — from the better vendors — a police report.

Signed retainers vs. leads vs. live transfers

The three purchased-supply models differ by how much qualification work the vendor has already absorbed. An exclusive lead at $585–$1,105 is an inquiry your intake converts at 10–15%. A live transfer at $80–$250 per qualified call is a screened claimant already on the phone, but only during staffed hours. A signed retainer at $1,500–$20,000+ is a case with the agreement executed. Price tracks absorbed work, not case quality.

Price tracks how much qualification work the vendor has already absorbed, not how good the case is. The middle column is the model most firms skip past and the one that most often fits — live transfer supply sits between the two extremes on both price and risk.

What signed MVA retainers cost in 2026, by case type

Signed MVA retainers are priced by case type, not by a single rate. Published vendor pricing runs $1,500–$2,800 for soft-tissue cases, $2,500–$4,800 for standard auto, $3,500–$6,500 for motorcycle and pedestrian, $7,000–$15,000 for commercial truck, and $10,000–$20,000+ for catastrophic and wrongful death. Tier-1 metros such as Los Angeles, Houston, and Miami run 1.2–1.6× those bands.

Retainer prices are aggregated from other vendors’ published rate claims, not from our own delivery data — we do not sell this product. Fee ranges are net attorney fees actually collected, not gross settlement values.

• Soft tissue / minor injury. The tier where the retainer premium is hardest to justify. Acquisition eats a quarter of the fee before a single record is ordered.
• Standard auto. The volume tier, and the one that overlaps almost exactly with a lead-derived cost per signed case at a 12% sign rate.
• Motorcycle / pedestrian. Higher policy exposure and clearer liability, priced accordingly. Supply is thinner, so vendors ration it.
• Commercial truck. The tier where buying signed cases is most defensible on pure arithmetic — acquisition falls inside the 5–10%-of-fee ceiling.
• Catastrophic / wrongful death. Priced case by case rather than off a rate card. Verify the medical documentation before you verify the price.

The same case costs different money by market

Every vendor in this category tiers its pricing by metro, and most will not publish the multiplier. California, Texas, and Florida carry the widest spreads, which is why quotes for “a standard auto case” vary by a factor of three between callers.

Our own lead pricing works the same way, except it is published per market rather than negotiated per caller — see the rate card, or check supply and pricing in California, Texas, or Florida.

Cost per signed case (CPSC): the only number that compares the two

Cost per signed case (CPSC) is total acquisition spend divided by cases actually signed, and it is the only figure that compares buying leads with buying retainers. For leads it equals cost per lead divided by your signed-case rate: a $420 lead at a 12% sign rate is $3,500 per case. For a signed retainer it is the sticker price. Cost per lead compares nothing, because the two products convert at completely different rates.

Cost per lead compares nothing. A $150 lead and a $3,200 retainer are not on the same axis until you divide the lead price by the rate at which your desk converts it. The formula is the whole argument:

The number that decides it

That is the whole decision. Buying retainers is a bet that your intake desk cannot outperform the vendor’s. It is frequently a correct bet — and it is a bet most firms make without ever measuring their own sign rate. Measure it first. The break-even model runs both paths at your numbers, and the full cost stack adds the agent time and software the media-only figure leaves out.

What everyone else publishes, and what we make of it

Six figures circulate in this category. Most are real; two are routinely misread. We would rather argue with them in the open than pretend our numbers are the only ones.

Where signed MVA retainers actually come from

Signed MVA retainers come from four kinds of supplier: ad operators who run their own campaigns and sign in-house, intake shops applying a call centre to leads bought wholesale, aggregators brokering signed files between originators and firms, and full-service agencies bundling retainers inside a monthly marketing fee. Aggregators carry the highest reassignment and duplicate-signature risk; bundled agency pricing makes a true cost per case hardest to compute.

We deliberately do not publish a vendor directory. Naming competitors on a page for a product we decline to sell turns an explainer into a referral scheme, and the archetype matters far more than the logo — two vendors with identical websites can sit at opposite ends of this table.

How fast cases arrive

Signed MVA cases are typically delivered within 24 to 72 hours of the retainer being executed, against four to eight weeks to build the equivalent flow from a new paid-search campaign. Speed is the model's genuine advantage. What matters more is recency of the underlying crash and whether treatment has started — a case signed quickly on a nine-month-old accident with no treatment is not a fast case, it is an old one.

The honest alternative to both models is building your own channel, which costs $15,000–$30,000 a month in a competitive metro and takes four to eight weeks to read — running your own Google Ads instead sets out when that is the better use of the same capital. The full vetting script for any supplier is on the questions to ask a vendor, and there is a retainer-specific version for this model.

What should be in the packet when a signed case lands

A complete signed MVA retainer packet contains nine items: the executed agreement naming your firm, an e-signature audit trail, a recording of the intake call, a HIPAA-compliant medical authorisation, the crash report or a retrievable report number, at-fault carrier and coverage detail, treatment status and provider, TCPA consent artifacts from the original inquiry, and a confirmed callback number. The three most often missing are the audit trail, the call recording, and the crash report.

A signature does not retroactively cure a defective consent record. If the original inquiry was captured without prior express written consent, you have bought a signed case and a TCPA exposure at the same price — the consent artifacts behind the signature are the five things any supplier should be able to produce for a file you pick at random.

Five checks before you buy a signed case

Before buying signed MVA retainers, verify five things: that the retainer names your firm rather than being assigned from another, that a police report or incident record accompanies the file, that treatment has actually started, that the claimant knows who is representing them, and that your state bar permits the arrangement as advertising rather than fee-sharing. A signed agreement the client does not recognise is a grievance waiting to happen.

Replacement, chargeback, and exclusivity terms worth arguing over

Six terms decide whether a signed-retainer contract is worth signing: whether a failed case earns a replacement or a credit, how long the chargeback window runs and what voids it, whether the vendor discloses its 90-day cancellation rate, whether exclusivity is per case or per territory, what the monthly volume cap is, and who indemnifies you if the claimant was improperly solicited. Agree the criteria for a failed case before delivery, never after a dispute.

Exclusivity means two different things here

Exclusivity on a signed retainer means two different things. Per-case exclusivity means the executed file goes to one firm and is table stakes — a retainer sold twice is a malpractice event, not a discount. Territory exclusivity means the vendor will not also supply the firm across town, and commands a substantial premium. Confirm in writing which one you are buying, because vendors advertise both with the same word.

The same word does the same double duty in lead supply, where the spread between definitions is the single most expensive ambiguity in a contract — exclusivity applied to delivered files covers what to get written down.

You still owe a conflict check

You still owe a conflict check on a purchased retainer, and you owe it before you act on the file. The vendor's intake team ran no conflicts search against your client list, adverse parties, or referral relationships. Run the check on receipt, and negotiate the right to reject a conflicted case for credit rather than replacement — a conflicted file is worth nothing to you at any price.

The number nobody in this category publishes

Purchased signed retainers discharge at a higher rate than cases a firm signs itself, because the client chose the intake agent rather than the firm. The gap between signing and your first call is where they are lost. No vendor in this category publishes a cancellation rate, so ask for it in writing before you ask for price — and treat cost per surviving case, not cost per delivered case, as the number that matters.

This matters more than the price tag and gets almost no attention. A purchased retainer that discharges in week three cost exactly the same as one that settles. If a vendor quotes $3,200 and 12% of its cases leave inside 90 days, the real figure is $3,636 per surviving case — which is above the lead-derived cost for any firm signing at 12% or better. The calculator above applies that adjustment; almost no vendor’s ROI model does.

Ask for the discharge rate in writing before you ask for price. A supplier that tracks it and will tell you is a materially different counterparty from one that has never measured it, and the answer costs you nothing to request.

Is buying signed cases compliant?

ABA Model Rule 7.2(b) permits a lawyer to pay the reasonable cost of advertising, including flat per-lead fees to a lead generator, while prohibiting giving anything of value for a recommendation. The operative distinction is whether the payment buys reach or buys an endorsement, and whether the fee varies with case outcome. A fixed price per lead is advertising; a share of the fee is not, in any U.S. jurisdiction.

ABA Model Rule 5.4 prohibits sharing legal fees with a non-lawyer, which is what separates a lawful signed-case purchase from an unlawful one. A flat fee per delivered retainer is an advertising expense. A fee calculated as a percentage of recovery, contingent on settlement, or adjusted for case value is fee-splitting and is prohibited in every U.S. jurisdiction regardless of what the agreement calls it. Ask how the price was set, not just what it is.

Capper, runner, and steerer statutes criminalise paying a third party to solicit or procure clients in person for a lawyer, and exist in most states with the strictest enforcement in California, Florida, New York, Texas, and Louisiana. They target in-person and telephonic solicitation of accident victims — not advertising. A vendor that generates inquiries through disclosed advertising and charges a flat per-lead fee sits outside these statutes; a vendor paying tow operators, chiropractors, or body shops for names does not.Signed-retainer supply sits closer to that line than lead supply does, because a third party has spoken to the claimant about representation. Model Rule 7.3 restricts solicitation of a specific person known to need legal services, and a vendor’s intake agent describing representation to a crash victim is doing something a court may characterise that way regardless of what the invoice says.

California’s SB 37 and the Unfair Competition and Professional Marketing Practices framework it sits inside add disclosure obligations for lead generators operating in the state, including bona fide contact information and transparent advertising attribution — worth confirming before you buy California supply from either model. Ask any retainer vendor how the claimant was contacted, what they were told about who would represent them, and whether the fee varies with case outcome. Detail on bar rules for lead buyers, and the model explained end to end on pay-per-signed-case.

Which model fits your firm’s stage

Firm size decides the answer more reliably than price does. A solo practice without a dedicated intake person should usually buy retainers or fix intake before buying anything. A two-to-five-attorney firm with one trained intake specialist is the classic break-even case and should measure its sign rate first. Regional firms with a staffed desk almost always get a lower cost per case from leads. Multi-state firms use retainers to enter new markets, then switch.

If half of firms never answer the phone, buy retainers — or fix the phone

The strongest argument for buying pre-signed cases is not about lead quality at all. Clio’s 2024 Legal Trends Report found roughly 48% of firms unreachable by phone and only about a third responding to email, and every retainer vendor in this market cites it. They are right to. If a claimant cannot reach you, nothing you buy converts.

But notice what the statistic actually indicts. It is an argument about your phone, not about the supply model, and both halves of it are fixable for materially less than the retainer premium costs. The firm in the result above moved from 6.1% to 14.2% signed-case rate in eleven weeks on identical supply at an identical price — answering inside five minutes, six attempts across three days, e-signature paperwork on the first call. At $420 CPL that is the difference between $6,885 and $2,958 per signed case, on every case, permanently.

If you cannot make that change — and plenty of firms genuinely cannot — then buying retainers is the correct decision and we would rather you made it deliberately. The intake requirements checklist is the honest test of which camp you are in, and the case study shows what changed.

What we sell instead

We supply exclusive, real-time motor vehicle accident leads at $585–$1,105per lead — one firm per lead, never resold, delivered by webhook within seconds of consent capture. We do not sell signed retainers, and we do not resell other vendors’ supply. Firms that already run a disciplined intake desk get a materially lower cost per signed case from leads than from retainers; firms that do not, generally should not buy leads at all until they fix intake.

See how to buy MVA leads, the published pricing benchmarks, the cost per signed case benchmarks for both models, or compare live transfer supply and the cheap end of the same ladder.