[nlstoldt]

Hi everyone! I was just wondering if anyone would like to share their ways of financing their adoption. We are just getting started and my husband is so nervous about the cost. Can anyone shed some light on this so I can get him to loosen up a bit!!!

Thanks!

[TerriBB]

You both need to sit down and realistically look at your budget. Look at the costs for the adoption and how you will absorb the cost of the child into your budget once he/she arrives home.

We are assuming that the adoption will cost about $30,000 - but then we will need daycare at $14,000 per year, an additional person on our health insurance and daily expenses such as diapers & formula.

Allow some for the "unexpected" (Our son had horrible ear infections and went to the M.D. every 14 times in 6 months - that's a $30 co-pay per visit, plus an Rx every time!)

If you have equity in your home, you can take out a loan. There are tax credits. Some people have had fund raisers through their church or huge garage sales. Do you have family members, such as grandparents, that have you in their will...maybe a candid conversation about your want for children. Our parents had no idea what and adoption would cost and both sets would have taken out a home equity loan to have grandchildren!

Only you two can look at your funds and decide - it may be trading in a car that cost too much to operate, removing vacation plans from your calendar or for you to continue working, even if you always thought that you would be a SAHM. We looked too at the cost of continuing fertility treatments and decided that the cost of 3 months would equal and adoption.

If your DH is like mine, sometimes it only takes time - you have to "plant the idea" and he needs some time to think it over.

Good Luck!

[adoptnky]

Here's what we're doing.


1. Savings - we had some saved up. Every little bit helps

2. Being Frugal - A lot of the fees are just little things here and there. (application fees, postage, notary/certification/authentication, birth certificates, background checks, passports, etc.) We tried to pay as much of that stuff out of our regular paychecks as we could. We started eatiing out less, and I went shopping less.

3. We went back and forth between a home equity loan or a personal loan. We happened to get a really good deal (interest rate) on a personal loan, so that's what we did. We got enough to cover our agency and foreign fees.

4. We have show horses, and my Mother in law also has show horses and antique carriages. We've sold one carriage and she is selling another. That money is being put toward the adoption. We also have one of our horses for sale, and if he does sell, that will go towards our funds also.

5. I get $5,000 from my work when the adoption is over so that will help.

6. I'm planning on doing a fund-raiser this fall. I sing and play piano. I've had people tell me over the years that if I ever put on a full concert (I ususally just sing at church) that they would come see me. So, I've decided to do just that. I've talked to some ladies at church, and they are going to provide a light dinner. I'm going to do a variety of songs, and have some of my friends in the community also perform. We are going to take a free-will offering and give half of it to our placement agency as they do missionary work in the countries that they have adoption programs in. I don't know how much it will bring in, but I'm hoping it will help off set the travel costs.

7. This one is my favorite because it was surprise. My husband has had a whole life insurance policy for the past 10 years. He has decided to switch over to a term life policy. We are going to be getting back a nice amount of money from his whole life policy that we've built up.

Hope this helps.

Kim

[tammy2]

Dont forget to apply for grants. We got $3,000 from Shaohannahs Hope. It was a great help.

[MaryCaryne]

Definitely apply for grants. There are several grants available that range anywhere from a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars. Many places won't let you apply until you've completed your homestudy, so be aware that you'll still need to pay for the application fees, homestudy fees, and anything else that comes before the completion of your homstudy.

We are considering taking out a loan...we've found a few low interest loans that work well for adoptive parents.

Talk to family...see if they're able to help in any way.

Sell stuff...garage sales, ebay sales, etc...they're great ways to raise money.

Some websites offer fundraiser items for adoption costs. A girlfriend of mine sold candles last year, another person I knew did these kid ID cards. It didn't raise a TON of money, but every little bit helped and knocked off bits of the total cost. I run a message board and we're putting together a cookbook...all the profit from the cookbook sales are going to the adoption costs (yes they already know about that...and they're all very excited about it). I'm estimating about $400-500 from that alone.

Anyway, those are some thoughts.

[sweettlc]

Hi there.

We are also just getting started. : )

We were blessed beyond belief to receive a $10,000 gift of money from our pastor and the church elders for adoption expenses.

We also have a line of credit from our mortgage that we will use to help to fund the rest of the adoption. We plan to pay back half of the money that we use from that line of credit when we receive the $10,000 adoption tax credit from the IRS and we plan to pay back almost all of the remaining balance of the line of credit with our 2007 tax returns.

Also, my plan is to be a stay at home mom and right now I am a stay at home wife but I plan to find a job and work from the time that our dossier is completed until almost the time that we travel to Guatemala to help cover the cost of a possible visit trip and other added costs like passports, paperwork, buying things for the baby, etc.

God bless.

[redru2004]

I know that when you're starting out on this journey, the financial obsticles seem insurmountable, but you'd be surprised where you can find the financing. Once DH and I signed with our agency we both traded in our expensive vehicles for perfectly nice, but much more economical vehicles, that alone is saving us about $600/mo. DH was driving a V8 Toyota Tundra, which was a huge gas guzzler especially when he drives 70 miles roundtrip for work. He now drives a vehicle that gets about 30 mpg which in the end saves us about $200 a month. We quit eating out as much, and now when we entertain friends it's chicken on the grill instead of steaks, we like to entertain so a lot of money went there. I got creative with grocery shopping, we ended up buying a food vac and now shop at Sam's, I save a ton on meat. All of our bonus' at work went into savings and we had originally planned on me quiting my job in October or so, closer to when we were going to have baby home, however my company announced my department was being moved to Austin, so I lost my job in April. It turned out to be a blessing though because I was fully vested. DH and I are already set up well for our retirement between a previous 401k I had rolled over, DH's, plus some pretty savy investments, we'll be set in another 30 yrs, so we decided to take the early w/draw penalty and cashed this 401k out, as of right now, we have all the funds we need to complete this adoption. Good luck to you, any sacrafice you have to make is sooooooo worth it!


Amie

[Mindybeth6]

At first when we decided to adopt we were soooooo excited. THen the reality of MONEY sank in. We were unsure what we were going to do. We only bought our home three years ago and didn't think we would be able to get a loan. However, the home improvements we made paid off and we were able to get 30K by doing a 2nd mortgage. I was soooo excited when that money finally came through. So we have everything in a bank account ready to go. Some stuff we have paid for ourselves like the passports, postage (which REALLY adds up) and legalizing and authenticating fees. I can tell you if you can get the money in a loan that's the way to do...if you can afford the payments. THat way you know the money is there regardless. We are also applying for multiple grants and having a fundraiser that in which we will get money from and hopefully we will get a grant. THat will be money to help pay off the 2nd mortgage and for travel expenses. I find it very comforting to know the money is there now though. I would not want to be trying to get money to at the last minute to cover expenses and we do not feel comfortable asking family for money. Just a personal thing. ALthough we would be able to get some if we REALLY needed it. Good luck and look at ALL options. I would go the credit card route as a LAST option. Just my opinion. You can get great rates usually for the first year but then you are stuck with a high % after that if you can't pay it all off. If God has a hand in your decision He will make a way.

Hugs

[itsinhishands]

Once we decided we wanted to adopt, we spent less on eating out, and we refied our home loan and combined all of our bills into one payment. That really helped alot. We managed to save over half the expenses ourselves by doing this. The other half, we got a personal loan from our bank. After the fact, I found out that there is one particular bank (MBNA???) that offers low interest, unsecured adoption loans. I'd look into that (ask your agency). The way I look at it, people get loans to buy cars everyday and don't think twice about it....

[AndreaP]

I had over half of it saved up. Then received a couple of monetary gifts from relatives. The balance I'm borrowing against my 401K. I figure if I'm going to pay the interest, I might as well be paying it back to myself.

[Stacytoadoopt]

Along with those other ideas, I started putting the amount that I will be paying for daycare aside. Due to various delays, it has grown to the point that I won't need to take out any loans. The good and bad about delays in the process.
good luck

[KayV]

We took some of it through home equity, and the rest we put on credit cards that offered 0% interest, and then we're just real careful about knowing when the 0% interest ends, and we transfer the balance to another card that's offering a good interest rate, under 4%, and so on, so basically we have an interest-free or almost interest-free loan.

KayV

[Larue]

Keep in mind the $10K adoption tax credit! Check out the recent thread...and PM or Email me if you'd like to figure out your adoption tax benefits.

Also if you have home equity to borrow against -- that certainly helps. And equity loan and line of credit interest -- versus credit card interest -- is tax deductible. Also check out the Dave Thomas Foundation for a number of organizations that offer "need based" adoption grants:

http://www.davethomasfoundationforadoption.org/html/considering/financial.asp

Not enough people take advantage of these grants. Best wishes for a smooth adoption journey. You’re in my prayers

[nwparents]

My husband and I saved until we had half of the adoption costs before we started. Then, we deposited our tax refund from 2005. After that it was beans for dinner until we made the final payment in cash. We don't have a huge money market account anymore, but we'll build it back up. We were lucky not to have to go into debt. We kind of paid as we went along. If we couldn't have managed to pay as we go, we would have probably taken out a home equity loan.

You'd be surpised at how much you can save when you drive economical cars, don't go out to eat, and shop at...(oh god, I don't want to say this) Walmart.

[paramom]

When we first started we did not have one dime saved toward the adoption. We started having yard sales and bake sales initially. Once families in our church found out what we were doing, they began to contribute things for us to sale. This helped us to keep going with yard sales once we had gotten rid of our own accumulated junk. You would be surprised how much money you can make if people give you really good things to sale. We also sold our bio kids clothes that they had outgrown on Ebay. We sold books on Amazon. We have also done a spaghetti dinner, baked potatoe and salad bar, and two hot dog lunches that we delivered to businesses. We did apply for a personal loan to help pay the first set of fees, because we are adopting two. We also have applied for several grants and received a small amount of money from each. There are lots of creative ways to raise the money. We have managed to raise the money for two infants plus agency fees in a short amount of time. If you type in adoption fundraisers on your search engine, you will get a lot of great ideas. We also borrowed a little from my dh retirement account, but because we had already raised so much money through fundraisers and family and friends donations, it was not that much. Hope this helps with some ideas.