Prospective parents may incur considerable expenses when adopting a child.
Private agency adoptions can cost prospective parents anywhere from $5,000 to $40,000, and International adoptions range in price from $7,000 to $30,000, according to adoption resource website Adoption.com. Prospective parents should take into account the various services they are paying for when going through the adoption process, including court costs and travel. Subsidies or employer benefits may help to offset these expenses, depending on the type of adoption.
Defining Adoption Costs
Adoption costs can be broken down into universal expenses and adoption-specific expenses. Universal expenses are the costs that prospective parents incur regardless of the type of adoption. These can include legal fees and the cost of completing a home study. An adoption-specific expense, however, is an expense related to a certain type of adoption. For example, there are expenses specific to foster-care adoptions and expenses specific to international adoptions. Some employers will offer adoption benefits in the form of reimbursing expenses or offering a paid leave.
Foster Agency Adoption
AdoptUsKids, a website produced jointly by the Children's Bureau, Administration for Children & Families, and the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, notes that most adoptions from foster agencies are free of charge. In many cases, children adopted from public agencies are eligible for monthly subsidies because of factors such as age, ethnicity or a disability. Adoption.com notes that the expenses incurred in a public agency are usually no more than $2,500 and typically include the cost of a home study, attorney fees and court costs to finalize the adoption.
Domestic Agency Adoption
A domestic agency adoption involves the adoption of a child born in the U.S. from a private agency. American Adoptions, a private adoption agency, explains that the costs for private adoptions tend to be higher because prospective parents are paying for numerous services during the adoption process. For example, in a private agency adoption, itemized expenses may include a home study, adoption counseling, birth parent expenses such as rent and prenatal care, and legal fees. These itemized expenses can run as high as $40,000 for private agency adoptions.
International Agency Adoption
A primary expense incurred in an international agency adoption is the agency fee. This fee, which can range from $7,500 to $30,000, covers such expenses as passports and the cost of hiring a translator. Prospective parents considering an international adoption should ask the agency if there is an orphanage fee in addition to the agency fee. This is a fee that amounts to a donation to the orphanage if the child is being adopted from an orphanage. In China, this fee is between $3,000 and $4,000. Additional international adoption expenses include home-study fees, notary fees, travel and legal expenses.
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