I was in a similar situation when I took Texas this past February. I was an out of stater, went to school in Indiana and had no familiarity with the Texas specifics. I’m currently taking Ca in July and I’ve gone through almost all the Ca essay subjects so I believe I might be able to lend some input in how things compare. As you mentioned, TX only offers a 30 min allowance per essay. I’d advise looking at past responses on the Texas Board of Law Examiners Thread. The universe of what is asked for some of the seemingly difficult topics is sometimes very limited. You’ll find board of Law Examiners repeats certain questions, sometimes almost verbatim. As for format, I used the CREAC format and submitted passing essays.Blackacrediznuts2018 wrote: ANY tips, recommendations or advice would be greatly appreciated.
You should find the topics of Wills, Trusts and Business Associations very familiar. Similar concepts and rules tested on, very close to the Ca subjects (some slight tweaks and distinctions). Which means you already have a fair degree of knowledge in 4 subjects guaranteed to be tested on. TX rotates between Trusts and Guardianships, this time they “might” do guardianships (they’ve tested on Trusts like 4 Times now). The subjects that were foreign to me were Commercial Papers, Texas Consumer Law, Oil and Gas, and Secured Transactions. Income Tax and Bankruptcy could possibly comes up as cross over topics but it’s on the less likely side, prioritize subjects guaranteed to be there.
TX is a community property state like CA but it is far easier, Ca is more formulaic whereas TX is more about the basics in my opinion. TX will test on the Texas Family Code as well which I don’t believe is that challenging. Consumer law is almost always Deceptive Trade Practices, Insurance, and Debt Collection (both federal and State). Sometimes the examiners like to squeeze in a trick into Secured (e.g. goods moving to a different state, name change of a debtor, fixture filings, etc.). For Oil and Gas make sure you know how to figure out fractional royalty interests and the terminology (Duhig Doctrine, Pugh Clause, Mother Hubbard Clause). TX will also give you another property question usually focusing Landlord-Tenant, a conveyance of land (just like CA both spouses have to agree to the transfer), rural vs urban homestead, etc. (there really is a limited set of questions they have for this one).
The TX CIV and CRIM portion is worth 10% and a short sentence answer will suffice. TX CRIM is becoming more difficult and I don’t think I’d be able to offer much advise there. As for TX CIV, the examiners recycle old questions.
As for study strategy, I think similar to Ca the trick is to dive-into the essays as soon as possible. You’re definitely at an advantage as you’ll have some familiarity with certain Essay subjects and you can pull off a good MBE (TX passing is 135 I believe whereas CA is 144). Overall, my impression from reviewing the material for both I believe Ca is slightly more difficult.