[mmarte317]

Hello,
I am eagerly wanting to adopt from Ethiopia and I am hoping that some experienced mommy's and daddy's can share some advice with me. I see that there are many agencies out there...and it is so hard to decide. I am from Florida and would like recommendations on agencies that you have used as well as cost. I see that all of the agencies have different costs.....is this one of those situations that "you get what you pay for" in terms of their service. OR is is just some like to charge more than others? Any help and stories that you can share would be good. I would love to hear the details of your adoptions.

Thanks so much, look forward to hearing from you....

Melissa

[kerriv]

It's really hard to compare apples to apples when looking at agency costs because many of them break down the fees differently. Some might have a higher application fee but a lower program fee. Some break it down into an agency and country fee. Some include things like your child's visa and incountry transportation in the country fee, making it higher, while others leave it out, making it lower.
With any agency, you'll need a homestudy, which will vary in cost by your area primarily. You will need your immigration clearance, which is the same everywhere and you can check the CIS website to see the current cost to file an I-600A. Dossier authentication varies by agency (what they require to be authenticated) and by states issuing the authentications.
Your going to have travel expenses with every agency and those will vary based on time of year, where you choose to stay, how your agency chooses to arrange incountry transportation, etc.
You might want to join the agency research yahoo group to see what people have to say about any agency you're particularly interested in.
I'll pm you also about my agency.