One of the questions people ask us most often about adoption is "Why is it so expensive?" The costs are a pretty big deal - the Ethiopia program is considered one of the least expensive international adoption programs and our estimated cost for it is around $20,000. The China program with our agency is slightly higher. These numbers may seem exorbitant at first glance; however, when you look at all the provisions that must be made to adopt a child they don't seem so unreasonable. Also, it is very important to remember that all of these expenses do not come at one time. They are spread out over the process, so you certainly do not have to have it all upfront. Here is a basic-as-I-can-make-it breakdown of where our money went.
Initially, we paid an application fee to our agency of $250. Our first significant cost was the $1200 we paid for our home study report. This went to a separate agency that sent a social worker for several interviews in our home and prepared a fairly extensive report on our fitness as parents that was sent to our agency and became part of our dossier - paperwork packet - that went to the Chinese government. Fortunately, we only required a home study update for our Ethiopia adoption which cost only a few hundred.
We paid about $750 per child to the U.S. Immigration Dept to process their visa applications.
About $100 went towards certifying each dossier at the state level.
We spent around $400 having our dossier certified at the US State Dept level and at the Chinese embassy. These fees for the Ethiopian dossier were slightly less, I think.
We paid $700 to have our dossier translated into Chinese. It cost $600 to translate our Ethiopian dossier.
We paid $1000 in a deposit for each adoption to guarantee that we would complete our post-placement adoption reports. Each country requires that a social worker visit with you after you have adopted a child and send them reports on the child's progress. Our agency implements this deposit system to insure you complete these reports, since it is one of the things that the relationship between our agency and the foreign government involved rests upon.
At the time that we joined them, our agency was charging a $6,000 program fee for China and a $4,100 program fee for Ethiopia. These fees cover all costs that are incurred by our agency here in the United States such as salaries for social workers and administrators, office expenses, etc.
There is a $5,000 international fee for China and a $7,500 international fee for our Ethiopia adoption (up from $5000 when we first joined.) This is what I left out the first time I posted this. Wow! What an error! These fees include general care for your child while they are in the custody of the orphanage, medical care for the children, fees associated with various levels of government processing the paperwork, and humanitarian aid to each of these countries. Adoption is not a simple business transaction -- our agency maintains a relationship with each of these countries that requires them to invest in each country's welfare above and beyond just the children that are released into adoption. I am very appreciative that our agency serves in this manner. These fees also go towards all the costs incurred by our adoption agency - staff, supplies, etc. The CEO of our agency DOES NOT take a salary for his work. He and his wife say that they have been blessed financially and as adoptive parents themselves seek to run this agency as a ministry. Our agency also does fundraising to keep costs for adopting couples as low as possible. These program costs are broken down into three payments that are due upon completion of the dossier, upon referral, and upon receiving the child. We have only paid the initial third of these costs so far. (The new policy, as of just last week, will require adopting families to pay 1/2 of the international program fee for Ethiopia when they send the dossier. Since we sent our dossier in April, we are being asked to pay 1/2 of this by January and the second half when we receive our referral. If the current timeline holds, we will be paying both amounts at virtually the same time.)
The final big expense is travel. Airfare is very expensive these days. Our visit to Ethiopia to receive our son will cost about $6,000, though this may be reduced some in the near future because of some recent changes in the travel arrangements in that country. Our trip to China will cost around $8,000. I'm looking forward to paying for those one-way tickets for our little ones!
We will have to supply post-placement reports on our children and re-adopt them in the United States. That will probably be $1000 or more.
So far by God's grace we have paid over $10,000 towards these adoptions. We were able to sell our home in the spring of 2007, settle our debts, and save a good start on our adoption fund; however, that was when the plan was to pay for the one Chinese adoption that at that time would be years-in-the-making. We then took a huge step in faith and added the second adoption that will be completed hopefully by early next year. We are praying to be taken care of in the future just as we have been all along. We are trying to be good stewards of the money that has been given to us through David's work, and we will be making an effort to raise funds through a T-shirt sale in the near future. We've also applied for grants through Shaohannah's Hope, and we plan to ask for help from our church's adoption fund.
These numbers can be overwhelming, but the truth is that we have seen time and time again how God has provided for others in our situations. I can honestly say that I don't have much worry about these things. I sometimes wonder about how it is going to happen, but more in an excited sense rather than a troubled sense, if that makes sense.
And there is a tax credit of $10,000 that you receive for each adoption. That can seem far away when you are in the midst of the process, but it is a MAJOR help in the long run.
The basic truth is that no one is trying to make things difficult for adoptive families by making the costs so high. There is some government corruption in international adoption, but thankfully that does not seem to be a problem in China or Ethiopia. Particularly in our case, there are many, many people working to try to make it affordable. We are very grateful to that and are hoping to pass on those blessings by working with a team on an adoption ministry which includes a grant that will be available through our church.
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