Archive for the ‘Free Legal Forms’ Category

Can You Trust Free Legal Forms Online?

Living in the 21st century with the internet at our fingertips ready to answer our every request for information we are truly both blessed and cursed with the sheer amount of legal advice and legal forms on offer at absolutely no charge. In a matter of seconds we can find a website willing to deliver us a legal form for any of thousands of different situations at no cost. There are however, as with everything in life, both benefits and drawbacks of using free legal forms.

For those of us on a limited budget (and aren’t we all!) the fact that we can get legal forms delivered to us for free is a massive benefit. Twenty years ago we would have had to hire an expensive attorney to produce a legal document tailored to our needs at great expense in terms of both the time it would take us and the financial outlay. However now not only can we find the legal forms we need online in seconds, there is a limitless supply of them as well.

Another great benefit of using online free legal is that you can alter them to suit our own specific needs. Although we can use the ‘stock’ forms as provided by the sites, we can also add or remove clauses as needed to suit our specific situation. As we all live unique lives and end up in unique situations the fact that these forms can easily be modified is a key benefit.

There are however some factors you need to be aware of when using free legal forms online. You need to check that they are:

(1) Accurate – Was the legal form actually written by a lawyer and is it a properly formatted legal document? Furthermore, is the form up to date? Not only are laws being made and amended all the time, they are also reinterpreted by judges on a constant basis. If your legal form is out of date or inaccurate it may not be valid or may even make you liable for the very things you were trying to avoid by using a legal document in the first place!

(2) Valid in the jurisdiction in which you live – Laws are made on both federal and state levels in the USA and so it is important to make sure that the free legal forms you use are valid in the area in which you live. A document that is legal in California may not be in New York, for example.

(3) Understood by you – Do you understand the legal form you are using? If you do not understand the document which you are using then you may end up in the very situation you were trying to avoid by using a legal document in the first place. It is important that you understand exactly what the legalese contained in the document means.

(4) Will you be giving away “link juice?” When you use forms on your websites that have been taken from elsewhere on the web, typically you will be required to leave links in tact that go back to the origin of the document. This can possibly affect your search engine rankings, not to mention visitors who actually read the form will see your forms have not been professionally drawn up. Overall this can be bad for SEO and bad for the overall image of your business.

So as we have seen the birth of the internet has gifted us with a great way to save both time and money with the opportunity to download free legal forms. However you do need to be aware of exactly what the legal forms you use mean and whether they are accurate and valid in your jurisdiction. The many options for free legal forms are a boon but you must exercise careful judgement when deciding which to trust.