Maintenance Bond

Categories: Bonds

You run a construction company. You were hired by a rich guy to build a mausoleum for his dearly departed pet iguana (it includes a 40-foot statue of Mr. Iggy). The client is demanding, liable to complain about the smallest imperfections. To make him feel better, you purchase a maintenance bond to cover yourself.

A maintenance bond represents a kind of surety bond. In case there's an issue with a building project (Mr. Iggy's tail falls off, the stone turns black in the rain, etc.), the bond will pay for any fixes that become necessary.

Generally, a contractor will purchase a surety bond on behalf of the owner of the completed project. The contractor will put up some portion of the total...like bailing someone out of jail...and a bit like buying insurance.

In most cases, the contractor pays about 1% to 4% of the total in order to purchase the bond. In Mr. Iggy's case, the grieving pet owner demands a $50,000 maintenance bond. That means you'll have to put up somewhere between $500 to $2,000 to buy the bond.

Related or Semi-related Video

Finance: What are Secured Bonds v Unsecu...51 Views

00:00

finance a la shmoop what are secured bonds versus unsecured bonds and

00:07

debentures okay so that's an insecure bond but we're talking about here is an [Insecure bond hiding under the sheets]

00:17

unsecured bond what is an unsecured bond well this is that was an unsecured bond

00:23

old school like 15 century old school it was just a handshake one guy promised to [People shake hands]

00:28

pay back another 400 pounds of barley in return for three sheep next year or

00:34

something like that and the sheep were the payment form not the guarantee and

00:38

the bond was loan emic bond ursins word in fact the promise to pay was secured

00:44

but by his word or commitment to repay the loans kind of old school debenture

00:49

unsecured bonds work similarly today corporations sell debentures to Wall [Corporations sending debentures to Wall St]

00:54

Street all the time debenture being a fancy word for an

00:57

unsecured bond it's just debt that the company promises [Definition of debenture]

01:01

to pay back well if they don't then oh well and yes the debenture holders could

01:05

in theory then take ownership of the equity of the company but in reality [Debenture holders take the majority of the company equity pie chart]

01:10

unsecured bonds when not paid back almost always mean the death of the CEOs

01:15

career and likely also of the careers of all the other members of the management [Gravestones for the management board]

01:20

team so while unsecured bonds are notionally more risky than secured bonds

01:25

well this issue hasn't been tested all that often in real life okay so if

01:29

that's an unsecured bond what's a secured bond well it's one that

01:34

is secured by a specific asset or value or other stores of wealth which get [Definition of secured bonds]

01:40

forfeited if the lendee doesn't pay back the lender on time and in accord with

01:46

the terms of the debt deal example the dung and the restless' is a company that [Sign for 'The Dung and the Restless']

01:51

makes fertilizer by collecting old political speeches and grinding them up [Speeches going into the grinding machine]

01:55

selling them to farmers in the Midwest you know for a coin but they also own a [Tractor spraying crops]

02:00

pork farm which is kind of separate from their main fertilizer biz they need [Hogs Gone Wild logo appears]

02:05

money to build a bigger grinder because politicians are giving more speeches

02:10

these days you the internet and all that and they [Politician being applauded]

02:12

pledged their pork farm as collateral behind that secured bond offering that [Collateral sign on the pork farm]

02:17

is if they don't pay back the bond interest and principle on time then they

02:22

lose the pork farm to the lenders yeah and that would be a pig mistake... [Guy snorts like a pig]

Find other enlightening terms in Shmoop Finance Genius Bar(f)