[Lillygirl]

HI,

I am wanting to adopt and we have chosen an agency and a country (china) But, we had some finacial problems in the recent past (with in a few years)

My husbands work got REALLY slow after 911 and we had just purchased a home. So, we had no savings at that time, and couldnt pay the credit cards. Were late on the mortgage.. yada yada yada..

Well, now we are ok as far as paying our stuff, but we cannot pay back the things that went 3 yrs with out anything. The only choice we have at this point is to file bankruptcy.

My question. Should we file now before we start the process and wait?? if so for how long.

Or should we go thru with the homestudy and all then file after we are done???

What is the opinion.

Do they ask if you've filed bankruptcy in the homestudy? I hear they dont run a credit check.

We just dont know if we should put off the adoption for say 6 months then start the whole thing, or start now and do the bankruptcy later?

Thanks,
Lilly

[MomofKaden]

Oh my! First of all, I preface my comments with saying this is just my humble opinion - take it or leave it!

My first thought is - WHY are you thinking to adopt from China?!! You couldn't have picked a more expensive place to adopt from, as far as I know, so this seems curious in light of your financial situation.

Second, have you ever considered going through your state's foster to adopt system or something more along those lines, since they would be low to no cost?

Third, any agency is going to ask you for a very specific financial statement...they will want W-2s, mortgage amounts, etc,etc...they ask ALL that stuff and being dishonest would obviously be a very bad way to go. Seems to me you'd be best to just get the bankruptcy over with if that is indeed what you feel you must do. But if that is the case, then obviously you would have to wait to start the adoption process, atleast for awhile. I think you are going to find that adopting from China with your current financial status is going to be very difficult. Adoptions there are $30000+ I think. You would have a much easier and lower cost time going domestic, I think, as well as potentially less stringent financial scrutiny. Just my two cents. Good luck!

[Lillygirl]

HI,

Well, we checked into it, and honestly the lowest cost place we 'qualified' for was china. Except for Hong Kong..

We have 2 bio kids so going thru the foster care system is a bit harder. I had thought about being a foster parent, but my little boy is EXTREMELY sensitive, and I honestly dont think he could handle it if we had a child in our home for a while and then it had to leave. ( he is majorlly up set over a cat that ran away over a year ago.. just cant get over it) So, I will maybe be a foster parent when he is a bit older (hes 8) but for now thats really not an option.

Hong Kong has only special needs children and they are over 2. I really wanted to have a yonger child if possible.

The agency we found says its about 16k to adopt from china. (great wall) and Ive talked to many others that have used them and they all agree that is right around the price. Some agencies were much higher. I found that agencies that dealt only with China were cheaper than ones that had several countries to choose from.

We will more than likely file, get everything in order and then start the adoption process. I have heard they dont run credit checks, so as long as we have it done and the finacial situation looks good after its done, I dont THINK we'll have a problem.. I HOPE!!


Thanks,

Lilly

[MomofKaden]

well, sounds like you already made your decision. Good luck to you.

oh and one minor point of clarity - foster to adopt is not just fostering - it is fostering children to adopt them...you can also adopt foster children without fostering to adopt...there are ways to not have foster children that leave your home, but only taking ones that are there to stay. Just so you know.

Also for comparison, we adopted our son domestically in a non-agency adoption and spent less than $8000 (we got him in the hospital - newborn and no health problems). Just so you know, but international adoptions are great too - just more expensive - we couldn't afford that. Good luck.

[Colorbind love]

You might still check into the African nations. Their qualifications are VERY lenient and they are very cheap to adopt from. Ethiopia's process is running about 5-6 months to get a child home, Liberia runs 3-4 months and Sierra Leone runs about 6 months now. There are very inexpensive programs in all of those countries, agencies placing infants and very young toddlers and the qualifications are much more lenient than China to adopt from the African nations.

Also, all of the African nations allow for escort rather than travel, which is significantly cheaper. But, even with travel, they run less than other countries.

Another inexpensive option with lenient qualifications is Haiti. Though, with what is going on there currently, I don't know the impact on adoptions at THIS moment in time.