Aggregate bond limit

Definition

The two numbers a surety writes: the largest job, and the whole program at once.

Why It Matters

Federal construction contracts above one hundred thousand dollars require both a performance bond and a payment bond before the award, and a fifth of this trade's revenue is government work. Bonding capacity is not a license that transfers. A surety underwrites the people who indemnify it and the balance sheet behind them, so new owners are new indemnitors and the program is rewritten around them. Ask for the single-job limit, the aggregate, and the surety's name before pricing the public backlog.