Knowledge is one of the most valuable tools in any legal matter. Our self-help page features highly regarded California legal workbooks, practical court-ready templates, proven self-advocacy resources, and guidance designed to help you navigate legal processes with greater confidence—whether you’re representing yourself or working alongside an attorney.
Criminal & Trial
Handbook for the Accused
Guide helps California defendants avoid rushed plea bargains by working with attorneys to build defenses, understand the plea system, and navigate bail and immigration consequences after criminal accusations more effectively.
California Criminal Defense Motions in Limine
Expanded edition by Victor VeVea and Roger Lampkin explains California trial motions in limine, used to admit evidence, exclude harmful evidence, and shape trial proceedings before jurors hear prejudicial material.
The Criminal Law Handbook
Book explains criminal law procedures, roles of police, lawyers, and judges, expectations for suspects, defendants, and prisoners, and offers practical guidance for effectively working with a lawyer.
Paralegal Handbook: California Criminal Defense
Handbook for criminal defense paralegals covering practical guidance, practice and technology tips, sample pleadings, and useful resources for supporting legal cases efficiently.
Family & Divorce
California Divorce Property Division
Practical guide to California divorce property division written for legal professionals, paralegals, and self-representing litigants. Covers dividing community and separate property, transmutation, debts, and enforcement of obligations.
California Marriage Law
Updated guide explains California marriage laws, recent legal changes, and provides sample prenuptial and marriage agreements, plus guidance on the legal rights, responsibilities, and protections available to unmarried couples today.
How to Manage a Contested Divorce in California
Despite outdated laws and forms, this guide helps people navigate difficult California divorces by developing strategies, negotiating settlements, managing attorneys, preparing cases, gathering information, and handling court trials effectively.
Legal Essentials for California Couples
Guide provides legal strategies for marriage, domestic partnerships, and cohabitation, covering finances, debts, property, support, parenting, adoption, inheritance, medical decisions, disability care, and end-of-life wishes.
Prenuptial Agreements: How to Write a Fair & Lasting Contract
Guide helps couples create customized prenuptial agreements covering debt protection, asset division, financial responsibilities, care for children from previous relationships, and other important financial arrangements in marriage.
Divorce & Money: Make the Best Financial Decisions During Divorce
Guide helps people manage divorce finances, including assets, debts, property division, support payments, settlements, and working with legal and financial experts effectively.
Estate & Planning
How to Probate an Estate in California
Guide explains California probate, helping handle simple estates, identify heirs, collect benefits, use non-court transfers, file paperwork, pay debts and taxes, and transfer property after a loved one’s death.
Nolo’s Guide to Estate Planning
Guide explains estate planning basics, including wills, trusts, powers of attorney, probate avoidance, tax and incapacity planning, guardianship, and end-of-life arrangements, helping readers prepare their affairs or work effectively with an attorney for future security.
Every Californian’s Guide To Estate Planning: Wills, Trust & Everything Else
Guide explains California estate planning covering wills, inheritance, guardianship, taxes, property rules, non-citizen issues, and probate avoidance tools like transfer-on-death deeds.
Landlord & Tenant
California Landlord’s Law Book, The: Rights & Responsibilities
Guide explains California landlord-tenant law, including rent control, evictions, deposits, maintenance rules, legal forms, Covid rent issues, and state and local regulations for managing rental property.
The California Landlord’s Law Book: Evictions
Guide explains California eviction process, including notices, unlawful detainer cases, tenant defenses, rent control rules, bankruptcy situations, and procedures for filing, defending, and collecting unpaid rent after judgment.
California Tenants’ Rights
Guide helps California tenants understand and enforce rights, including housing search, disputes, repairs, discrimination, deposits, lease breaks, eviction defense, rent control rules, and updated eviction laws affecting renters.
Every Landlord’s Legal Guide
Guide explains California landlord-tenant law, covering tenant screening, leases, maintenance, deposits, evictions, discrimination risks, repairs, and updated state rules for managing rental property legally and effectively.
Foreclosure Survival Guide
Guide explains how to handle foreclosure in California, including saving a home, loan relief options, bankruptcy strategies, avoiding scams, HOA issues, and using the 120-day foreclosure waiting period effectively.
Business & Court
Everybody’s Guide to Small Claims Court in California
Guide explains California small claims court procedures, including case valuation, demand letters, settlements, filing papers, gathering evidence, presenting cases, appeals, and collecting judgments, with forms and updated court rules.
How to Form a Nonprofit Corporation in California
Guide explains how to form a California nonprofit corporation, obtain tax-exempt status, prepare incorporation documents, create bylaws, maintain records, complete filings, and manage organizational requirements using forms and instructions.
How to Form Your Own California Corporation
Guide explains how to incorporate a California business, protect personal assets from creditors, prepare corporate documents, issue shares, maintain records, and comply with current legal, tax, and filing requirements using updated forms and instructions.
Credit Repair: Make a Plan, Improve Your Credit, Avoid Scams
Guide explains how to improve credit by managing debts, budgeting, negotiating with creditors, correcting credit report errors, rebuilding credit, preventing identity theft, and avoiding credit repair scams under updated reporting rules.
Trustee’s Legal Companion, The: A Step-by-Step Guide to Administering a Living Trust
Guide helps trustees administer living trusts, manage assets, handle taxes, work with beneficiaries, seek professional help, and distribute trust property effectively.
Make Your Living Trust
Guide explains living trusts, probate avoidance, trust advantages and disadvantages, property transfers, successor trustees, and creating a trust independently or with an attorney, helping readers decide whether a living trust fits their estate planning needs.
Nolo’s LLC Handbook: A Complete Legal Guide to Creating and Operating Your LLC
Guide explains forming and managing LLCs, covering documents, agreements, filings, ownership arrangements, buyouts, records, dissolution procedures, and templates.
Law Forms for Personal Use
Guide provides legal forms and instructions for estate planning, guardianship, powers of attorney, rentals, loans, property sales, and other personal and family legal transactions, helping readers manage records, delegate authority, and handle legal matters confidently.
Nolo’s Guide to Single-Member LLCs: How to Form & Run Your Single-Member Limited Liability Company
Guide explains single-member LLCs, including formation, liability protection, tax treatment, compliance tasks, recordkeeping, and pass-through deductions for small business owners.
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