Adoptive Parents: Estimate to Actual Cost (clicky poll)

jacksjerseygirl

PLEASE only those that have been placed with their child respond to the clickly poll.

[Poll]

jacksjerseygirl

For us, we failed to look at the 'other' fees that occur after placement which are not associated with fees to our agency. 

In our state we are required to have 4 post placement visits leading up to finalization (friends of ours in PA had them EVERY two weeks until finalization). We write a check to our SW after each post placement visit for $350 - so that comes out to be about $1,400 extra.

I thought this poll would be interesting to do because I think sometimes the fees we see with agencies are misleading or end up being more due to extra circumstances. Even if you decide to go with an agency because their fees are 10k less than another agency - in the end, depending, they might actually equal out., You just can't go by the estimates/averages that the agency gives you.  

CaptainSerious

I think the results so far (at this point, no one voted their costs were less than estimated) are very telling.

Our agency quoted us the homestudy fee and the "fees to adopt from Peru."  Little did we know at the time this only included the agency and country fees, and did not include any of the following fees/costs:  US Immigration, certifications, fingerprinting and background checks, necessary documents, psychological report, etc.  We're going to end up paying almost double what we were quoted.

GLynn2009

We are in a special kind of situation with a IA that is private. We know the family and consider them family but are not blood related.

We are having to do a Hague Adoption from Canada and neither of our SW have done this before (Hague). I did lots of research and often feel like I am telling the people involved in our case what to do. Just yesterday I was told one thing then I went back to a letter that I received and refered them back to it to tell them that what they said was wrong. I feel like this is taking much longer than we were told and I feel like my SW did not know the cost involved. We are only paying for what has to be done on the US side since DD is in state custody in Canada. We have not went over what my research indicated that we would have to pay which is less than $5,000. The only thing I did not budget was travel because we were told we would not have to go to Canada and I am waiting on a date to make our second trip. Canada has indicated that they will probably pay for this trip like they did before.

I don't think that we we mislead I just think that they did not know.

jacksjerseygirl

CaptainSerious:

I think the results so far (at this point, no one voted their costs were less than estimated) are very telling.

Our agency quoted us the homestudy fee and the "fees to adopt from Peru."  Little did we know at the time this only included the agency and country fees, and did not include any of the following fees/costs:  US Immigration, certifications, fingerprinting and background checks, necessary documents, psychological report, etc.  We're going to end up paying almost double what we were quoted.

Yep, I agree!

I forgot to put that also - some how in my mind I thought that some of the admin. fees we were paying to the agency took care of the finger printing, background checks, etc but they didn't. Since we both had lived in several states in the past five years - we had to run state checks in a few places too. I will have to look it up but I think we ended up spending another few hundred dollars for these paperwork things too.

At first, it seems like a little amount 50 bucks here, 50 bucks there but now that we are about 2 months away from finalization - I see how we did go over our number given by the agency due to all of the "little" things that add up. 

ColoRxGirl

As far as the adoption, so far we have paid exactly what I anticipated.  But we are not even placed yet, so who knows?

The only thing that was a surprise was the nickel-and-diming by the attorney.  I'm not complaining; he's a great guy and we appreciate his services - but I'm always amazed when I see attorneys literally charging in minute increments for what they do for you.  Oh, and a monthly "maintenance fee" to keep my retainer in an escrow account.  Good grief.  I know the guy's gotta make a living, too, but I've never retained an attorney before so this was all new and wonderful. 

rottimom

We were told about 25k for an instate adoption which was MOST likely with our agency.  It ended up being out of state, Texas to be exact, and it was  considerably more than that...plus traveling twice to finalize. All of the post placements-- we did them monthly for 6 months. It really added up.

I am trying to be much more up front with agencies-- how much will it really cost????  none of this nickle and dime stuff this time.

 

lisanjay

Our agency told us to expect between $20,000 and $30,000. We were hoping to that it would be around $25,000 and it looked like it was until we got a few bills earlier this month that were higher than what we expected. So it looks like we will have  paid about $30,000 when all is said and done. Our agency ended up only costing us about $12 or $14,000 so the rest of the fees were homestudy, medical, bmom expenses (pretty low), attorney for us, ad litem for bmom, ad litem for bdad,ad litem for baby, [ost placement visits, hotel cost,travel. IT adds up!

jacksjerseygirl

lisanjay:

Our agency ended up only costing us about $12 or $14,000 so the rest of the fees were homestudy, medical, bmom expenses (pretty low), attorney for us, ad litem for bmom, ad litem for bdad,ad litem for baby, [ost placement visits, hotel cost,travel. IT adds up!

I know - it is amazing isn't it!? I don't think that as pre-adoptive parents we thought really about all these 'extras'. While it is nice to be able to be in a wide open pool for an e-mom from 'any' state - that can come with its own set of expenses based on legal, medical, living expenses and travel.

 

rottimom

Sad to say it but I think agencies bank on you not adding up all of the pieces to actually get it done because who would willfully take on double the stated fees if you knew that ahead of time?  We were quoted 25k.  We know it cost about 55-60k by the time we were done.  That is a very different number.  But it comes slower, in small bills, $ for this, $ for that, $ to finalize, travel, $ admin fees for this or the other thing.  craziness.

She is worth every single penny I have or ever will earn...no question.  But it would be better for AP is we know up front that is will be lots more than that agency fee.  I don't know.  I am trying to weigh the desire for more babies with my intention of giving the child I have a great life.  I don't want to spend away our future happiness and/ or retirement on agency fees.

lisanjay

It does add up quickly. We knew $30,000 was the max we expected but still hoped to come in under than that.

If one or both eparents are under 18, they are going to need an ad litem and the AP will be paying for that.The ad litem for the bdad was about $500 more than what we had anticipated. Plus most states if not all require an ad litem for the baby...so the AP pay for that. We got about $4000 back from our agency but of course that went towards the other fees. The medical fees were higher than what we expected but my husband called the hospital and got 25% knocked off of it. My husband is an attorney so we knew all the attorneys would bill us in six minute increments, so that was no surprise. BUT our attorney was 5 hours away from emom and she visited emom twice. Once on emoms request and once after birth. So of course we were charged for attorney's travel time which each one probably added up to $1500. The agency also nickels and dimes everything but we did get some money back and we tried to work through our attorney more than through agency to cut cost.

Like the PP she is worth every single penny and she is the daughter I am meant to have.

 

 

Thank goodness we had saved up more than $30,000 during the year so this adoption was paid for in full, no loans or credit cards. BUT now I am only going to be working at the most 4 days per month so there will be no way that we will be able to save like that again. The next adoption is most likely going to have to be word of mouth and a  private adoption, to cut out about half of the expenses (no agency).

karalee402

Just echoing what others have already said - we completely weren't prepared at the time for all the "additional" costs.  Things like post placement visits and the legals for finalization - it was nice that they came months later, but we didn't include them in our original budget.  I wouldn't change a thing because I wouldn't have Lily, but it was more than anticipated!

DBurket

Because of all the complications we had with our placement, we ended up with FAR more legal bills than we had anticipated. Travel (last minute flights, days or weeks in a hotel, etc) ended up being a bigger chunk of our final adoption expenses than we originally planned for as well. Those two things (legal and travel) were the bulk of our "extra" costs, though all the other little stuff does add up too! It really is crazy when it's all said and done how much $$$ is spent isn't it? Of course, it's worth every penny and more.

P.S. Jacks... I sent you a PM. Thanks!

crystalpopcorn

We are still very early in the process.  However, our agency did provide an estimate of "additional expenses" upfront.  They made it clear that the agency fees are just the agency fees, and said they don't want adoptive parents to be surprised by the additional expenses that arise during the process.  They said we should budget around $2,500 for any BM expenses (which are optional), fingerprints, mileage, medical co-pays, etc.  The agency fee includes post placement visits.  When I checked agency references, they said the total expenses were pretty much dead on.  The only additional variable expense they mentioned was mileage to provide counseling to the BM. The mileage expense depends where the birth parents live, since the BP counselor drives to them for counseling. 

I am hoping the final expenses are close to the estimate. 

TheNextWest

We may be in the minority, but ours was almost exactly what we were told upfront- with the exception of we were only planning for one baby! However, there was information provided that said in the case of twins, there is basically a "buy one, get one half off" deal, so as soon as we were chosen to parent them, we asked about cost and that's what we were told again and that's what we paid. Our costs were right on. Unfortunately, since we were chosen before our homestudy was completed, we didn't have time to save for one baby, much less two! So either way, we weren't prepared, but as far as the money goes- we paid exactly what our agency told us we would from the get-go.

LadyRed7

We are just about active, so i obviously didn't respond, but it is promising to see the high percentage of costs that were fairly close to what AP had anticipated.