When to Bring In a Lawyer (And When You Don’t Need One Yet)

Early-stage companies rarely need a lawyer on every decision — but the few decisions that do need one tend to be expensive to fix later.

Bring in counsel early for

Founder equity splits and vesting, the first priced or SAFE round, anything touching IP ownership, and your first enterprise customer contract. These shape the company for years.

You can usually wait on

Standard NDAs, simple contractor agreements based on a vetted template, and routine vendor sign-ups. A one-time template review is often enough until volume or risk grows.