A contract is a legally binding agreement between two or more people or business entities that creates obligations for each party to perform. Some people prefer to go the “cheap” route by picking a form randomly off the Internet and plugging in details trying to customize the form without having the legal knowledge to do it right. When things go wrong, as they often will, if the completed form is enforceable at all the court’s interpretation of what it means can come as an unpleasant surprise to the nonlawyers who signed it.

If you’re going to get legal forms, get them directly from a competent lawyer instead of trying to pick something and make it fit to your situation without knowing what needs to be included to protect your legal rights.

A better course of action is to have your attorney actually draft a customized agreement that reflects your needs. Most business deals contain unique characteristics. In the long run, the extra you pay for a customized contract now can save you lots of legal fees later.

About the Author

With an advanced international law degree from Georgetown University and more than 14 years of real world legal experience, Attorney Mike Young shows entrepreneurs how to protect and grow their businesses online. He's the author of "Internet Marketing Legal Secrets Revealed," "How to Create Your Own Internet Business Without a Lawyer for Under $175," and the creator of Website Legal Forms Generator^TM. Not just a lawyer who focuses exclusively on Internet and marketing law, Mike’s been working with computers for more than 27 years (his first computer was an Atari 400 with 8 KiB RAM) and started representing Internet businesses back in 1996.