How much do you pay to incorporate?

[Brian Barfoot]

So I have a partnership that just turned into an LLC. We paid a lawyer about $1800 to do all of the paperwork and transfer one property's ownership. This felt high but my partner is associated with the firm and felt doing business with them would be beneficial. I want to form another LLC for the properties that I own outside of the partnership. Is there any strong reason to use a lawyer for this instead of just doing it through the state? (NY in my case.) If you use a lawyer, how much is reasonable to pay?