Bradford Miller Law, P.C.

Focus and practice areas

Real estate law and estate planning carry most of the workload at this Chicago firm. The real estate side covers residential transactions, short sales, commercial leasing, purchases and sales, landlord-tenant matters, and City of Chicago building code violations. Buyers, sellers, investors and property owners all appear in the client description on the firm's own pages.

The estate planning work is drafting-heavy. Wills, powers of attorney, trusts and health care directives are named, along with living trusts and long-term care planning. The firm also handles matters where real property questions run into Illinois probate law.

Business law sits alongside those two. That means forming LLCs and corporations, drafting operating and partnership agreements, and contract drafting.

How the team is built

Bradford Miller is the senior attorney. He grew up in the Chicago area, studied at Illinois State University and at Oxford University, then earned a J.D. and a master's degree in real estate law from The John Marshall Law School.

That master's degree is worth pausing on. Real estate law is one of the fields where a J.D. alone leaves plenty of ground uncovered, and a dedicated master's signals sustained study in the area the firm puts first. Miller's own work covers real estate law generally, with short sale representation and landlord-tenant matters called out by name.

Other attorneys the site names

Jonathan Blair is listed as an associate attorney, in memoriam. He attended Eastern Michigan University and earned his J.D. from The John Marshall Law School in Chicago. He was selected for Illinois Super Lawyers, Rising Star edition, in 2012, and his practice areas were real estate law and estate planning.

Jena Solorzano and Thomas Horton are also listed as attorneys. The firm gives their names on the attorneys page.

In my opinion, keeping a deceased colleague on the attorneys page with an in memoriam note says something about how the firm treats its own. It costs nothing to quietly remove such a listing. Bradford Miller Law kept it.

Where the firm works

The main office is in Chicago. The firm also lists offices in Naperville, Elgin, Lincolnshire, Orland Park and Westchester.

That spread traces the collar counties around Chicago: DuPage, Kane, Lake, Cook and the near western suburbs. For real estate practice it matters, because closings, recordings and municipal inspections are local by nature. A property transaction in Elgin involves different recorders, different local ordinances and different inspection routines than one in Orland Park.

The Chicago building code violation work is a good example. Those cases run through the City's Department of Buildings and, when they escalate, the Circuit Court of Cook County's building and municipal departments. Owners typically receive a notice specifying the violation, then face a hearing date where a judge or administrative hearing officer decides whether the condition has been corrected and what penalties apply. Bringing the property into compliance before the hearing usually shapes the outcome more than argument does.

What the record shows

The firm's public evidence is modest and consistent. A named senior attorney with a documented education path, a named associate with a 2012 Rising Star selection, two further named attorneys, six office locations and a defined set of services.

The site does not state a founding year, and it publishes no email address or social media links. As a reviewer, I treat that as a gap in disclosure, though the practice-area detail is specific enough to judge what the firm actually does.

What the practice areas involve

A short sale, one of Miller's named areas, is a sale where the lender agrees to accept less than the outstanding mortgage balance. The seller submits a hardship package to the lender, the lender reviews the offer, and the transaction closes only if the lender approves the shortfall in writing. Deficiency language in that approval determines whether the seller still owes the difference afterwards, and reviewing it is legal work.

Landlord-tenant matters in Chicago fall under the Residential Landlord and Tenant Ordinance, which sets rules on security deposits, notice periods and habitability that go beyond state law. Cases proceed in the eviction division of the Circuit Court of Cook County, and procedural missteps at the notice stage often decide them before any hearing on the merits.

Estate planning follows a quieter rhythm. A will directs distribution after death, a power of attorney authorizes someone to act during life, and a health care directive states treatment preferences when the person cannot speak. Living trusts sit outside probate, which is why they come up in planning conversations where a family owns property in more than one county. The firm's description of overlapping real property and probate issues points at exactly that situation.

Who this firm suits

The client profile follows from the services. Homeowners buying or selling in the Chicago area, landlords and tenants with disputes, property owners facing a City violation notice, families putting a plan in place, and people starting an LLC or corporation who need formation documents drafted.

The narrow practice focus is a real signal. Two core areas plus business law, handled by a small named team across six suburban and city offices, describes a firm that has chosen its ground.

Bradford Miller Law, P.C. operates from 216 S. Jefferson in Chicago with the attorneys and services named above.

Firm identity and initial contact

The directory name is Bradford Miller Law, while the legal name in the record is Bradford Miller Law, P.C. That corporate suffix is a small but useful distinction when a prospective client compares the listing with an engagement letter, invoice or other formal document. The shorter name is the public-facing version; the P.C. name identifies the firm in its formal capacity.

The firm offers free consultations. This gives prospective clients a chance to discuss the proposed matter before an engagement begins. That initial conversation has particular value for business formation work, where the choice between an LLC and a corporation affects which formation papers and internal agreements are required. It also provides a place to identify whether a contract request concerns a new venture or an existing business relationship.

Two telephone numbers appear in the record: 312-238-9298 and 312-379-3163. Both use Chicago's 312 area code, which fits the firm's stated city base. The consultation offer and direct telephone contacts provide the clearest public information about how a prospective client can begin the intake process.

Additional depth in the attorney record

Jonathan Blair's separate practice-focus entry adds general litigation and administrative law to the subjects associated with his work. Those areas extend the attorney record beyond the real estate and estate planning descriptions on the firm side. General litigation points to contested matters, while administrative law concerns proceedings involving government bodies or agencies. The record presents these as parts of Blair's individual practice history rather than as separate current firmwide service categories.

His education also has a local connection beyond the degree itself. Blair earned his J.D. in Chicago, while Bradford Miller completed both of his law degrees at the same law school. That shared institutional background is one of the few documented links between the attorneys apart from their work at the firm.

Business formation as a defined category

The directory classifies the practice under both business law and business formation. That pairing gives formation work its own place rather than treating it as an incidental part of a broad commercial label. The underlying service record supports that classification through entity creation and the preparation of governing documents. Contract work then reaches business needs that arise outside the initial filing stage.