📖 Guides
The rules behind a legal situation, decoded in plain language — verifiable facts with their statutes, never advice. Each guide ends at the calculator that does the actual math.
What Texas counts as net resources
Texas applies its child support percentages to net resources, a figure its Family Code defines with a closed list of deductions. It is not gross pay and it is not take-home pay, and the difference changes the guideline number.
Updated 2026-08-02
How parenting time enters California's support formula
California puts timeshare directly into its statutory child support equation, so every overnight moves the number. This explains where the timeshare term sits in Family Code section 4055 and why its effect is larger than it looks.
Updated 2026-08-02
The four fault rules, and the wording that decides cases
Your own share of fault reduces a recovery in most states, bars it in some, and bars only part of it in one. The gap between a fifty percent rule and a fifty-one percent rule decides real cases, and the statutes say so plainly.
Updated 2026-08-02
Caps a legislature still prints after a court struck them down
A damage cap can be held unconstitutional and remain published on the legislature's own website with no annotation. Florida's medical malpractice cap is the live example, and reading that page literally reports a limit that does not apply.
Updated 2026-08-02
The deadline that ends a claim regardless of its value
Limitation periods for injury claims run from two to several years, but the period is the easy part. When the clock starts, which version of the statute applies, and whether a government defendant shortens everything matter more.
Updated 2026-08-02
Which states actually publish an alimony formula
A short answer to the question every alimony calculator skips. Two states compute a guideline amount by statute, two more cap it without publishing a formula, and the rest leave the number entirely to the court.
Updated 2026-08-03
Counting overnights so the figure survives scrutiny
Support guidelines that account for parenting time count overnights, not hours. This explains what each standard rotation produces over a year, why holidays move the total, and how the count feeds a support calculation.
Updated 2026-08-02
What a self-proving affidavit does, and where a notary is not the point
In almost every state a notary is not what makes a will valid. The notarised part is a separate affidavit that lets a will be admitted to probate without tracking witnesses down. Two states break the pattern, in opposite directions.
Updated 2026-08-02
Handwritten wills: recognised, restricted, or rejected
About half the states recognise a handwritten and signed will with no witnesses. A few recognise them only for soldiers and mariners. Florida rejects them even when validly made elsewhere. The conditions differ more than the headline does.
Updated 2026-08-02
Protest deadlines are rules, not dates
Many jurisdictions set the deadline for contesting an assessment as a condition rather than a calendar date — thirty days after notice, or a fixed date, whichever is later. A table printing only the fixed date sends some owners away too early.
Updated 2026-08-02
What assessing authorities actually want to see
An assessment appeal is an evidence argument. Comparable sales and documented condition problems carry it; adjectives do not. This explains which comparables help, which ones weaken a list, and how to organise the rest.
Updated 2026-08-02