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Home and Business Lawyer Deluxe 2008
By Broderbund
San Francisco, California, 2007
CD-ROM for Windows, $39.99
(Available as a download)
(800) 395-0277
www.broderbund.com |  |
HALT Do-It-Yourself Best Buy
Consumers can find three other software packages on the market - H&R Block's Home & Business Attorney, Bluecase's Rocket Lawyer and Broderbund's Family Lawyer 2008 - that use software identical to that in
Broderbund's Home and Business Lawyer Deluxe 2008. The only differences among these three products are the titles and packaging. All three include the same legal resources, online resources, video presentations, navigation tools and selection of legal forms (although Family Lawyer offers a smaller selection of the same forms).
Home & Business Attorney
by H&R Block Digital Tax Solutions
Block Financial Corp., Kansas City, Missouri, 2007
CD-ROM for Windows 2000/XP/Vista, $39.95
(Available as a download)
http://shop.taxcut.com/store/taxcut/DisplayHomePage
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Rocket lawyer deluxe Home & Business 2007
By Bluecase Software
San Francisco, California 94127, 2007
CD-ROM for Windows 98/Me/2000/XP, $39.95
(Available as a download)
www.bluecase.com
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Family Lawyer 2008
By Broderbund
San Francisco, California, 2007
CD-ROM for Windows, $19.99
(Available as a download)
(800) 395-0277
www.broderbund.com
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The Home and Business Lawyer Deluxe 2008 CD-ROM includes one PDF reference book (Estate Planning Companion) plus answers to frequently-asked legal questions like "My mother has Alzheimer's. Is it too late for her to create a power of attorney allowing me to handle her affairs?" Users can read the answers on screen or listen to talking-head presentations by Harvard law professor Arthur Miller.
Other features include My Profile, which compiles basic information about you and your business; Personal and Business Document Wizards which suggests a list of forms you may need, based on your answers to a short interview; and a Document Manager which lets you edit, print and save your documents. Home & Business Attorney also includes a Plain Language Law Dictionary, a Keyword Search and a financial calculator to help you compute interest on loans, figure out monthly mortgage payments or determine retirement saving needs.
Over 1,200 legal forms, agreements and worksheets are offered under two broad categories: "Home" and "Businesss" documents. The product covers everything from requesting a birth certificate to writing a simple will or trust. There's also an extensive collection of miscellaneous letters, worksheets and simple contracts.
Gone from this edition is the step-by-step audio tutorial of how the program works. That's not a big problem, however, as the program is easy to use even for first timers. New in the 2008 edition of Home and Business Lawyer is a feature that allows you to design, share and securely store your legal documents online (free for the first 30 days and then you must subscribe). When connected to the Internet, you can also link to recommended Web sites or consult with online attorneys at a discounted rate (via Ingenio's Rocket Lawyer Legal Advice Center). An important, and now more commonly used feature, is the ability to secure your documents with password and encryption technology.
Home and Business Lawyer offers concise explanations that accurately summarize the law that applies to each form, along with background information in three other areas: Reasons to Create, which helps you decide whether you need to use a particular form; Before You Begin, a list of the information you need to complete the form, and Reasons to Update, which helps you keep your legal documents accurate and current. If you register your purchase online, you're entitled to 12 months of automatic online updates.
| Comprehensiveness | Grade: B |
Home and Business Lawyer covers an extremely wide breadth of topics and provides multiple resources to help consumers understand their options. In addition to wills, trusts, powers of attorney, landlord/tenant agreements, and purchase and sales agreements, you also get documents that help you with consumer disputes, credit problems, financial planning, medical issues, business matters, dealing with the government, and dealing with family and personal issues. The estate planning documents in this program are imported from H&R Block's WillPower.
Home and Business Lawyer fails to adequately cover two popular "do-it-yourself" legal topics, divorce and bankruptcy. The program provides a "worksheet" for each topic that you can complete and give to an attorney, but fails to provide more substantive information, forms or guidance on these areas. The discussion of bankruptcy is very general and does not address the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 that drastically changed the way Americans file for bankruptcy. The software package makes up for these two shortcomings, however, in the sheer number of helpful forms, agreements, letters, worksheets and notices it provides on practically every other topic.
Home and Business Lawyer successfully avoids almost all legalese and uses language that should be accessible to most consumers. It also includes The Plain-Language Law Dictionary, a searchable database of 7,000 entries that define legal terminology. While this resource is impressively thorough, the definitions are sometimes less than helpful to nonlawyers or to lawyers for that matter. For example, the legal term a priori is defined as follows: "To reason a priori is to conclude that from what has existed previously, certain effects must necessarily follow (Latin)." And the term "joint and several" is defined as, "An expression denoting unity, as distinguished from separate or individual." Users can, however, click on hyperlinked legal terms within definitions to find out their meaning and then click on the "Back" button to return to the original definition they were looking up.
Home and Business Lawyer installs easily (Windows only). The program's clear navigation tools allow you to move back and forward among forms, the estate planning reference book and online resources without losing your place. There are a few aspects of the program that are not entirely intuitive. For example, it's difficult to figure out where the law dictionary is (it's under "Tools" not the "Library" tab where you think it might be) and although the program provides a useful "Smart Data" feature, it never explains how to use it or where to find it (it's under the "View" tab).
Getting to the actual legal documents is easy, however. You can go directly to an entire listing of documents and do a search by keyword or category, or you can click on the "Home" or "Business" tabs and call up forms that way. Once you find what you're looking for, you click once to learn more about the document and the laws governing it and twice to open it. When you open a form, you immediately launch the interview process, where your answers are used to complete the form. There's also a "Document Wizard" button that, when clicked, conducts a general interview on estate planning or your business interests and then selects the documents it "thinks" you need based on your answers.
Although forms can be edited through the "Document Editor," it's strongly discouraged because the authors fear your edits will invalidate the documents. In previous editions, the program wouldn't even allow you to export your documents to your personal word processing program. That's no longer true.
Home and Business Lawyer does an excellent job of warning users about potential pitfalls with pop-up warning boxes if you forget to answer important questions, if state laws vary, or if lawyers or additional resources should be consulted.
| Quality of Legal Forms | Grade: B+ |
Home and Business Lawyer allows you to produce excellent looking documents, but only in Windows. The forms can be edited in the "Document Editor" and previewed before being printed.
"This program is not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. This program provides forms and information about the law, and suggestions on how to use the program. The program cannot and does not provide specific advice for your exact situation, and it cannot decide whether the program's forms are appropriate for you. Because the program cannot decide which forms are best for your individual situation, you must use your own judgment and, to the extent you believe appropriate, the assistance of a lawyer.
Estate planning documents are not valid in Louisiana. If your estate is expected to be larger than the federal estate tax applicable exclusion amount ($2,000,000), it may be desirable to use more complex estate planning techniques that are not provided by this program."
Home and Business Lawyer is a very sophisticated piece of software and its selection of forms, agreements, letters, and notices allows virtually any do-it-yourselfer to complete professional-looking legal documents for both personal and business use. We rate this product a HALT Do-It-Yourself Best Buy.
101 Law Forms for Personal Use
6th Edition
by Attorneys Ralph Warner & Robin Leonard and Ralph Warnerwith the Editors of Nolo
Nolo, Berkeley, California, 2007
368 pages, $29.99, CD-ROM for Windows and Macs
(800) 728-3555
www.nolo.com
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HALT Do-It-Yourself Best Buy
In addition to forms that you might expect to find in a legal encyclopedia (for example, contracts to buy or sell personal property, simple wills, powers of attorney, promissory notes, and releases), 101 Law Forms for Personal Use includes forms for the care of children, elderly property and pets; home repair, maintenance or remodeling; handling personal finances; hiring childcare, eldercare or household help; buying a house or renting property; borrowing or lending money; living together; settling legal disputes; taking care of executor duties; dealing with direct marketers; power of attorney for real estate; security agreements and an executor checklist. 101 Law Forms also includes tear out forms, forms on CD-ROM and an index.
101 Law Forms has been updated three times since we last reviewed it. It provides a thorough and plain-language overview of contract law, including discussions on what it takes to make contracts legal and enforceable, and why a contract might be found invalid by a judge. State-by-state information is given when applicable (for example, Chapter 11 lists which states require a witness' signature on a power of attorney) and readers are alerted if a particular contract is not recognized by their state or if an institution (like a bank) requires you to use their form instead.
| Comprehensiveness | Grade: B+ |
101 Law Forms provides many legal forms you will not find anywhere else, such as pet-care agreements and a request to begin special education for your child. In the updated edition, Nolo revises and updates all of the forms in the book. The new edition also includes a new form - the Executor's Checklist - to help you settle the estate of aid those dealing with the affairs of a recently departed deceased loved one.
This book also explains what each form does and gives helpful hints, such as Web sites to visit or worksheets to complete before completing filling in the form. For example, in Chapter 6 "Buying a House" the authors recommend visiting one or more Web sites for information on agents, lender rates and different geographical areas.
Gone from this, and some of the previous editions, are the forms that help you prepare for divorce or separation. Perhaps the publisher wants to keep the book to a reasonable size, but the omission of these forms is unfortunate.
Plain language is used in the text and the forms. Although the authors'
statement that "contracts in this book are written in everyday (but legal)
language," is accurate, traditional legal terms are used such as revoke,
assignment and encumbrance. The product does not include a glossary that
defines these and other terms in one place, which would be helpful to
consumers.
101 Law Forms includes some of the best step-by-step instructions we've
seen on actually filling out the forms, including Editing and Adding to the
Forms; Describing People, Property and Events; Selecting From Several
Choices (among clauses); Preparing, Signing and Storing the Forms;
Requiring a Spouse's Signature; and Notaries and Witnesses. There's also
valuable information on using alternative dispute resolution clauses.
The forms (there are actually 106 in the book) are easily photocopied
and completed, or computer generated. If you use the CD-ROM, you can open,
edit, complete, print and save the "rich text format" forms using your
Windows or Mac word processing program.
Areas that warrant special attention are flagged with special icons. Readers are told when they may need to contact a lawyer, when to consult other resources, whether they can skip or skim a section and more.
| Quality of Legal Forms | Grade: B |
The computer-generated forms look more professional, because you can edit out unnecessary language. Form preparers have to be careful, however, not to edit out relevant information and to remember to renumber clauses in the agreement if irrelevant clauses are deleted.
"We believe accurate, plain-English legal information should help you solve many of your own legal problems. But this text is not a substitute for personalized advice from a knowledgeable lawyer. If you want the help of a trained professional - and we'll always point out situations in which we think it's a good idea - consult an attorney licensed to practice in your state."
101 Law Forms provides a great selection of legal and practical forms for personal use at a very reasonable price. It identifies some of the most common legal needs a consumer will have and provides easy-to-use forms to meet those needs. The addition of simple will forms for couples with or without children and an Executor's Checklist form to help executors fulfill their duties is very helpful and greatly enhances this product's usefulness. At $29.99, 101 Law Forms is an exceptional value and is rated as a HALT Do-It-Yourself Best Buy.
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