Put Provision

See: Put Option. See: Putable Bond. See: Putable Common Stock.

The provision or right of having a put means that the owner of that right has the right to sell to someone else the underlying asset.

Example:

I have a put provision when I pay $385,000 for your home...to put it back to the bank for $350,000 any time in the next 3 years for...pretty much any reason. I'm paying a premium for the house, and the bank is throwing me a kind of insurance chip, in allowing me to maintain a put provision when I've bought the home.

Why would they do this? Bad times, bad moon a-rising. Think: 2008/2009 mortgage crisis echoes. Banks were desperate to buy time and get out of bad loans, so all kinds of deals were made to get homes sold and out and into the hands of people who could actually pay back the money they'd promised to pay back.