Choosing Financial Freedom

3 Methods You Can Use To Post Bail

31 August 2016

Aubree Mccoy

An arrest with jail time can cause many problems in the accused person's life, as they won't be able to go to work and continue meeting their financial obligations. Fortunately, the judicial system in the U.S. allows you to pay toward the bail of an accused person for them to be released from jail and go about their life until their court date. Here are three options you can use to post bail for someone who is in jail.

Hire a Bail Bond Service

One of the first methods you may think of when you are presented with the idea of having to post bail is to hire a bail bond service. This type of service will make an agreement with the court on your behalf that they will pay the entire bail amount if the accused individual does not show up for their court date. In return, you agree to pay the bail bondsman a non-refundable fee as a percentage of the bond amount. This amount is usually a ten percent fee that you pay to start this bail bond process, which allows the accused to get out of jail on bail until their court date.

Be sure you are ready to accept responsibility for the accused to make sure they appear in court on their court date; otherwise, you will be held responsible to the bail bond company for the entire amount of the bail. For example, if the accused person's bail amount is set at $50,000, you pay a ten percent non-refundable fee of $5,000 to the bail bond company. If the accused misses their court date, the bail bond company owes the $50,000 to the courts and will collect it from you or try to find the accused person to sue them for the money that has been forfeited to the court.

To complete the bond agreement, the bail bond company will ask you to put some collateral toward the bond agreement to cover the costs of the bond if the accused misses court. Examples of collateral you can put toward the bond can include assets, such as your home, a vehicle, jewelry, money in a savings account, or stocks.

Create a Signature Bond

In some states, such as Illinois, Kentucky, Oregon, and Wisconsin, bail bond companies are not allowed to do business, so the courts can allow bond to be posted on a signature. In this situation, you or the accused person can sign for the bond. Then, if the accused misses their court date, you or the accused that has signed for the bail would be responsible for paying the courts for the entire bail amount. Depending on the state and the court, the court can require you to pay ten percent of the bail amount in addition to signing for the bail.

If you don't have the entire ten percent, you can ask friends and relatives if they would be willing to sign on the bail and combine funds to collect the entire ten percent bail amount. You and any other individuals willing to sign for the bond can also put personal property toward its collateral.

If you decide to use real estate as collateral on the bond, the courts will usually require the property to be worth 150 to 200 percent of the bail. For example, if the bail is set at $50,000, your property would need to be worth from $75,000 to $100,000 for the courts to approve its use as collateral.

Take Out a Loan

If you have good credit, you can take out a personal or signature loan to pay toward the bail. Keep in mind if the accused misses their trial, the bail will be forfeited to the courts and you will still owe on the payments of your loan. 

To help you get a loan, you can talk to your bank about using a vehicle or other valuable property without a lien against it to be placed as collateral against the loan. Other times, you can get a signature loan, which requires no collateral against it.

Use this information to help you determine the best type of method to post bail. You can try here for more information.

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