Adoptees: How much did your own adoption cost?

Heather B

I'm not sure, I'll have to ask Mum. I think I was cheap though.

Hmmm wonder what I'd be worth today - healthy white infant - I've seen them described here as "hot commodities"

ETA I beg to differ with the opinion that adoptees don't know the cost of their adoptions. NEWSFLASH ADOPTEES HAVE OBSTETRICIAN BILLS ALSO!!! (or did the stork drop us off) Anyway, I was in a shopping mall in NJ recently with a friend and a woman (total stranger) got chatting to us, she had her adopted kids with her and was telling us how much she paid for each of them. I felt really sorry for these kids, who must surely feel like commodities - ick

btw to compare natural birth and adoption is buying into one of the most deep-rooted myths in adoption i.e. that there is no difference between the two :(

Adoptionissadnsick

$10,000 in 1971 wonder what I'd cost in today's dollars?

Andraya

Around $2000, that included the airfare to pick me up, physicals for both of them and paying court fees.

Nowhere near what it would cost to get me today.

***edit

After looking through MY adoption papers the grand total is... drumroll please...

$180 for two physicals
$300 homestudy and psych screen through social services
$85 court fees
$120airfare for two
$50 rental car and gas

I was way cheaper than I thought! But don't worry, I don't know anything about it, I am forever a child to be kept in the dark. ROTFLMFAO!

Gershom

A few hundred dollars were spent, i was adopted from foster care.

sunny

I think it was just under a thousand.

However, my natural mother said she had to pay for her own delivery & stay at the Florence Crittendon home, so I guess the rest was profit for the agency.

Debbie Downer

Court, filing, and attorney fees... $500
Adoption agency and related fees...$3000
Reuniting with my family after 25 years of separation...priceless.

Laurel J

I was, technically, free. Legal fees for my adoption (in 1965): about $200. My a'parents also had to pay about twenty bucks for the clothes I was wearing when they took me home.

I was adopted through the state, so no agency profited from my adoption. Any lawyers involved didn't gain much either. And I do know--I asked my a'parents and they showed me the papers.

Phoenix

I don't know, they never told me. I'd be worth big bucks now though - healthy white female baby. Thats a depressing thought!

Isabel A

Well the adoption worker's analogy is not entirely accurate as adoptees also have obstetrician bills. We come into the world just like everybody else. My first mothers insurance paid for most of that and she was placed by the agency in a "wage home" and worked as a nanny to five children to make money to pay for the rest of her hospital bill. Does anyone else see the irony there?
My parents paid about two thousand dollars in "fees". They were told that some of the fees would cover my birth expenses but as we now know, that was already covered by my first mom.
Makes me wonder where that money went.

Theresa

Around $8K in 1963, but my adoption was not through an agency; it was a gray market adoption.

LaurieDB

Well, even though I was adopted out of foster care my aparents did use an agency, so there were fees for that. But, since I was older, I always wondered if perhaps they got a discount, or even a rebate! You know, it's a bit tough to place the older ones. I mean, this was back in the 1960's, so it must've been something for my amom to suddenly show up with a 2 year old one day.

Now, my nparents had to pay any hospital and doctor fees not covered by their insurance. My ndad tells me he also had to pay with a big piece of his heart. He told me that it was gone for 35 years! But it was finally given back to him when we reunited. I don't know about my nmom, since she had already passed away by the time I could have asked.

I'm the adopted person, so of course everyone knows I didn't pay anything at all, right?

scorpio_queen_2003

I was a freebie-i'm mixed race and unplaceable- only joking!.i was adopted through Foster Care,so my parent's only paid for the necessary court fees,etc.

edit- my birth mother did not pay any hospital fees,but she didn't have a job or anything.she was just out of high school

Problem Child

I think it was a few hundred, just to cover the cost of home inspection, paperwork and such.

Lillie

Oh, the usual...stork fees, gardening fees to keep the cabbage patch productive...

(because apparently adoptees aren't "born", like non-adoptees are...)

Crucio

I was adopted via the foster care system so they obviously had to pay for a lawyer and court costs, but nothing like what some people might pay going through an agency or private adoption.

Daisey Duck

From the paper work I saw it was $500. But that was in the early 60's.

concerned

Not an adoptee, but my daughter's adoptive parents paid about $15,000 for her.

So it cost the aparents a few thousand.

It cost me my soul.

Danaaaaa

trust me..if you were adopted then your parents did not get you for free. adoption costs a lot.

kflie83

I was $500. It was all court and lawyer costs though. My brother was about $10,000 after flying to Brazil. You'd think a kid from an orphanage in Brazil would be cheaper than a whitie from Seattle, but nope (=

lahdh4

Would love to know how you figure that one.
I figure that my daughters adoption probably cost about 25,000$ if not then it was probably more since at the time both of them worked and while the agency had a sliding scale fee schedule the costs were up there.

Tobit

$ 250 for legal expenses. Everything else was free...until they got me home.

dragoness

Uh I asked my mom but she said that money isn't important and that it will never change who I am... apparently I was a lot though... ****** I wanna know now!

ErikW

I'm very sure they would tell me, but I couldn't imagine asking my parents how much it cost to adopt me.

youhoo it's me

oh my your scaring me I had no idea that the cost of adoption was an important factor for the value of life I hope my children never ask how much their adoption was but believe me the emotional cost was way more than the monetary cost was

mscrawdad

I adopted two children for $0 dollars. The only fees were documentation fees of I think around $500, but that was waived. They said it was because we were adopting more than one child that they waived the fee, but they waived it for everyone. Plus they sent us Adoption Assistance payments every month until the children were 18. The amount was the same as you get for a foster child. We didn't ask for the money, they said everyone gets it.

'-hlepeachother-sizzlefrap

Truly it cost no more to adopt a child than have a baby without insurance in most cases.

Still Me

Generally, adoptees do not know how much their adoption cost, just like non-adoptees do not generally know how much the Obstetrician bill was! And, nothing in life is free! : )

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