S/O - second placement

MyColonyNJ

Since we are not doing DA, and have never researched it, I have no idea what the answer to this is.

The previous post got me thinking.

If you just recently brought home a baby from DA and then get another call right away, do you have to pay all the fees all over again?

Or is there just a portion of the full fee that you would pay, because obviously your homestudy would be current.

My guess would be you would just pay the portion of fees that relate specifically to that child (legal fees, medical fees, etc).

Thanks

kgs0505

I'm not sure what the answer would be in regards to fees, but would your homestudy really be current?  You have another person in the house, so it would have to updated at the very least...

julandjo

Don't most agencies have rules about how old your youngest must be?  For all the agencies that I've looked at so far, the youngest must be 18 months before applying, and you can't go "active" until they're 2. 

-Stephanie-

Our agency has the "no artificial twinning" rule.

jacksjerseygirl

In my research most agencies will not allow you to do a second newborn adoption until that child is at the least 9 months old. This isn't necessarily only the agency rule but they have it in place because when it comes time to finalize in the court - this could weigh on the court and judge. Obviously best interest of the child is still the ultimate rule but it can cause problems.

I'm not sure if some states have an explicit law that says they will not finalize a second adoption within 9 months or not unless there are special circumstances (ie: sibling group, foster-adopt, or something). I seem to recall an attorney saying something about this but not 100%.

I think it also becomes an issue if you haven't finalized one adoption and then are placed with a second child - I think this is looked down on because you haven't completed the evaluations and assessments to ensure you are a healthy and good family for the first child.

Edit: Regarding fees - you will have to have at the least a home study update and if it has been past a certain period of time you will also have to go through all the background checks again. Also, the BM would be different so the medical fees, legal fees, and living costs (if provided) would be completely separate and additional from the first adoption. Many agencies provide a waiver or fee reduction in their fees if come back for a second adoption in x amount of time but you will still have some costs with them for the administrative work and counseling services their staff provided to that specific BM.

Knowing how our adoption fees were broke down - our second adoption would cost about 80-90% of what the first one did because medical, legal, counseling, living expenses (even if it is a token amount which Grant's adoption was), updating our home study, post placement fees would be separate - that all makes up the bulk of DA expenses IME - the administrative fees our agency makes are really only about 25% of the cost of our total adoption costs for Grant.

So the fees for a second or third adoption are going to be roughly that of the first adoption with a few fee breaks, at least with my agency.

MyColonyNJ

Thanks for the info - like I said, never looked in to DA, so never even knew about the ages of other children or other things listed

Thanks for the education

PSU-NCBride

I don't think ours had any age requirements. However, in the one case I talked about where they adopted two newborns within 2 weeks, they ended up doing the second adoption privately. I'm not sure what exactly happened but I know the BM did not like the way the agency treated her and I do not think that the adoptive family was supported by the agency to do this. The adoptive parents told the BM to call them back when she got an adoption attorney and almost immediately, an attorney was on the phone with them.?