Thoughts on These Agencies?

trigirl79

Right now, we are looking at a national agency. We understand we will likely pay more but that will mean shorter wait times. Does anyone have any info, advice, or thoughts on these three agencies:

1) American Adoptions

2) AdoptHelp

3) Independent Adoption Center

 

THanks! 

KdgTeacher

Two of them at talked about in the post right below yours.....

amm78

We're with the Independent Adoption Center... their fees are actually on the lower end of all the agencies we looked into.  From our experience so far, they are very ethical and are counseling-based.  Remember, though, that they can't guarantee a shorter wait time because wait time depends on so many factors... our wait is going on 2 years.

trigirl79

Thanks! Is Georgia an "IAC" state? We are in VA and it's not so I was wondering how that would work. 

amm78

Yes, Georgia is an IAC state... my understanding if you aren't in an IAC state is that you would have to hire someone licensed there to do your homestudy.  Then, I'd think that you might have to have someone in your state (an attorney or another agency) to handle the ICPC side of things for you if you match with someone in another state.  Not sure, though.

IRR

As PP stated, higher costs does not mean a faster adoption.  There are some on this board who had really inexpensive adoptions that happened in a matter of months and others that paid a lot that took years. 

trigirl79

Thanks. I understand the wait is dependent on a lot of factors, but it does seem like the agencies around here are very small and just don't get a lot of birthmothers. We are definitely still in the phase of researching at this point!

silliestbunny

Hi... we were with one of the three listed above.  Great organization... they quoted us 6-9 months wait.  Yet we waited 22 months and ended up matching outside of their organization.

We were open to gender, open to certain ethnicities, open to marijuana use and situational drugs, open to Emom expenses.  We were 37 years old at the time w/careers that I think are noble. We own our home and have cute pets.

My point in sharing all of this... on paper we looked "reasonable"... yet our wait and journey was quite long.  Don't let wait time be the swaying point in your decision making.  It's all arbitrary

Figure out other important factors.... whatever they might be for you.  I am happy to brainstorm... And acknowledge wait times is worth considering... but it's not everythign.

A big one I think most people overlook is money at risk.  If you go w/one of hte big three and get unlucky like we did (and one other close friend of ours), what does it mean if you decide to network and look elsewhere.  For us, it meant losing $11K.  (Had I gone w/the agency that I felt most pulled to, we would have only had  $3K at risk.)