It's really not[1]. The most important thing is to know who's sitting on the other side of the table. As a lawyer I've been asked to negotiate dozens of these c

It's really not[1]. The most important thing is to know who's sitting on the other side of the table. As a lawyer I've been asked to negotiate dozens of these contracts. And been sued on exactly one. The irony? The one sued on was one the tightest and my client was 100% in the right. But the other guy was an asshole and we hoped the airtight contract would protect us. We settled and paid him a non-trivial sum. Have seen it repeatedly in situations short of lawsuits where the two sides are of markedly different sizes. The smaller party can negotiate whatever they want and then the big party will still proceed to do what they want and as long as there is still more business going on (sue them and lose the rest of the work). [1] Of course there are exceptions: the most important of them is stipulations that will actually cost you money. That is, the business terms. Then there are terms that can cost you reputation and non-compete clauses that make you lose other work. There are terms you want to watch out for, but my experience discussed above is that it's not the contract that gets you sued, it's the asshole on the other side that you decided to do business with.