James “Jay” Holland is a trusted litigator who advises and advocates for our clients. He has represented our clients through a wide variety of legal disputes, ranging from disagreements over real estate, business controversies, and trust and estates dissensions.

Jay is a commercial litigator with twenty years of experience. Jay left partnership from a large Southeastern law firm to practice in his native Eastern North Carolina. Jay rejoined several of his long-time colleagues at Lee Kaess, and he brings a wealth of litigation experience and insight to our growing firm.

Through his years of legal practice, Jay has handled a wide variety of real estate matters, including title insurance claims, boundary disputes and partition actions, reformations of title instruments, contested foreclosures, landlord-tenant actions, disputes over restrictive covenants and easements, and other land use and zoning matters. He has represented clients in will contests, claims against estates, breach of fiduciary duty cases, and trust modifications.  Jay has also litigated matters involving disputes over commercial contracts and negotiable instruments, the recovery of collateral under security agreements, non-compete and non-disclosure agreements, employment contracts, and insurance policies.

Prior to attending law school, Jay gained significant experience in the insurance industry as a property and casualty representative and then medical malpractice claims consultant for major insurers. After law school, Jay developed his litigation skills in health care and personal injury litigation matters, including those involving automobile accidents, slip and falls, product liability injuries, and medical malpractice claims.