Comparing American Adoptions to Other Professionals.

This question allows you to determine their ability to find birth mothers. Most professionals lump together all types of adoptions like step parent, referral, international, home studies, etc. Lumping it together is an acceptable industry standard but it does not give you the information you need to make the best decision. In a recent phone inquiry to another adoption agency, we were told they completed 61 adoptions last year. Upon asking the question above, we discovered only 20 of the 61 adoptions came from their agency finding the birth mother. This agency initially told us their waiting time was two years, but upon further review we discovered they had a waiting list of 82 families. If you do the math, considering 20 adoptions a year with the 82 families, the actual wait is over four years. You must understand most professionals are not trying to mislead clients, most just don’t track waiting times or fees very well, this leads to clients joining their list on poor information. Others have drastic drops in placements and therefore their waiting times are outdated. It is not uncommon for adoption professionals to forget to update their fees and waiting times.

This allows you to determine the amount of families they have recently signed up so you can see if they are managing their list compared to placements.

You need the answer to this question to see how many families are on the list and this is how you can tell if the waiting times are accurate.

This allows you to determine if there are any noticeable trends either positive or negative.

It is easy for an agency to provide you a referral list of satisfied clients but talking to clients can provide you some insights into the challenges you might face with a particular professional. It is not uncommon for the referral list to become outdated, so be sure to ask if you can speak to clients who have adopted more recently.

This information will provide you indicators of an adoption professional’s availability and ability to respond to their clients needs. Do not take the above availability indicators lightly.

You will more fully understand the actual fee risks/rewards with a particular professional.

It is important to realize that professionals who only work in one state are subject to greater variation in their adoptions. When a professional works in more than one state, they are not as vulnerable to slowdowns because a slow down in one state will often be offset by an increase in another state. Below were American Adoption’s placements in four states:

 

If we only served Kansas, our lower Kansas placements in 2004 and 2005 would have resulted in less adoptions for our families. This would have meant our families would have waited longer. However by serving 50 states, our slow down in Kansas was offset by an increase in adoptions other states. This resulted in consistent waiting times for our families.

Slowdowns in a particular state can be attributed to the following:

• Increased competition from other adoption professionals, especially from national professionals.
• More local adoption professionals start to serve the state.
• Change in laws that lower or increase adoptions.
• Bad press from a local adoption story.
• Natural down turn in adoptions for a particular area.
• Referrals slowdown.
• Local advertisements become less effective.
• Advertising amount is decreased or doesn’t keep up with the competitors.
• Birth parent support is decreased.

This allows you to gain some insight into their fee allotments. You can then compare those fee allotments to industry standards. With an itemized breakdown, you will be able to determine if a professional is providing inaccurate estimates. Let’s say a professional provides you a total cost of $20,000 while another professional provides you an estimate of $25,000. Without an itemization, you might wrongly conclude the $20,000 is less expensive. When you have a breakdown, you will be able to see the differences and discover low allotments. A professional who allots 50 percent less in advertising will often mean you will wait twice as long. A professional who estimates lower living expenses than industry standards are often not providing an accurate estimate. Keep in mind estimates are usually educated guesses and sometimes professionals just guess, so do not be swayed by lower estimates that prove to be inaccurate. Do your homework upfront. You can call our staff for further assistance at 1-800-ADOPTION.