While we encourage you to use the contact form on this page, you can always email or phone us:
Send Us a Message
Get in Touch
molly@surrogatescreeningsolutions.com
475-273-6586
FAQs
Have a question that’s not answered here or elsewhere on the site? Contact us. We’re here to help!
About Surrogacy Screening Solutions
Molly has had almost a decade of experience at clinics and surrogacy agencies supporting intended parents and their surrogates. She established Surrogate Screening Solutions to offer a high level of support to intended parents matching independently at a cost must lower than an agency fee.
• Review of the laws of your surrogate state with a licensed attorney to determine if the match will work legally and the current termination laws
• Intake with your surrogate to review medical and pregnancy history, discuss the surrogacy process, confirm compensation, journey expectations and termination views
• Request and review medical records and compare to clinic requirements to see if they would medically approve your surrogate
• Background check of all adults over the age of 18 in the home
• Virtual home visit
• Psychological evaluation for your surrogate with our LCSW
• Group match meet with our LSCW
• Insurance review or assistance applying for a surrogate friendly policy
Get more detailed information on our screening.
Your first step is a complimentary consultation. Schedule a session.
Fill out the contact form on this site, or send an email to molly@surrogatescreeningsolutions.com, or call us at 475-273-6586.
Costs
Our surrogate screening package is $1,500 and our case management and support package is $10,000. Learn more about what’s included in these packages.
- The cost of a journey can vary widely depending on clinic costs, surrogate compensation, medical bills, legal fees and if there are any newborn or pregnancy complications. A good estimate is $150,000-$200,000.
Here is how it breaks down:
• Clinic Costs: $10,000 to $50,000+
• IVF Medication: $2,000 to $10,000+
• Legal Fees: $5000+
• Agency Fee: $0-$40,000+
• Compensation: $0-$75,000+
• Other Miscellaneous expenses or milestone payments: $0-$5,0000+
• Insurance: $0-$10,000+
• Copays, Coinsurance, Deductibles: $0-$10,000+
• Hospital Costs: $0-$500,000+
• Lost Wages: $0-$50,000+
• Childcare for Surrogate: $0-$5,000+
Sometimes! More and more employers are adding this benefit. Please check with your employer’s HR department. Carrot and Progyny are two programs some employers use.
Employers that offer surrogacy benefits include Adobe, American Express, Cisco, DoorDash, Ernst & Young, Facebook, Johnson and Johnson, Nate, Northwestern Mutual, Pendo, Pinterest, Rubrik, Salesforce, Starbucks, Unilever, Viacom, and Walt Disney Company.
Men Having Babies provides advocacy, education and financial assistance to gay men pursuing surrogacy.
BabyQuest Foundation is dedicated to helping couples and/or individuals build families through advanced fertility treatments such as IVF, egg and sperm donation, embryo donation, and gestational surrogacy.
The Cade Foundation is a nonprofit that serves the needs of families battling infertility through information and financial support.
Gift of Parenthood helps couples & individuals struggling with infertility achieve their dreams of becoming parents through fertility assistance grants.
Family Formation Charitable Trust is a financial grant program for family building in the amount of $500 to $2000.
Journey to Parenthood provides grants of up to $10,000 for family building.
- • HELOC
• Crowdfunding
• Cash out 401k
• Fertility Financing Loans (CapexMD, New Life Fertility Finance, Origin Financing, Prosper Healthcare Lending)
Escrow
Yes, it is industry standard to have all funding for a surrogacy journey held by a separate entity.
Money should be held in escrow at least 6 months after delivery to make sure that all pregnancy and delivery expenses have been paid.
Seed Trust, SAFE Trust Services, Clarity Trust Services, and Stork Escrow.
$1,250-$2,000
Legal
Yes, an attorney is needed for drafting the contract as well as assistance with the order needed for parentage.
Yes, your surrogate should have a separate attorney for the contract.
Contract Drafting by your attorney: $2,500-$3,000
Contract Review by your surrogate’s attorney: $1,000-$1,500
Assistance with parentage paperwork in state where baby will be born: $1,500
Your first step is to make sure that you are working with a surrogate who lives in a state where you will be able to establish your parental rights. This is done by consulting with an attorney in her state.
You should have the wills drafted to ensure a guardian is in place if something were to happen prior to delivery.
You will complete a contract with your surrogate where she acknowledges that this is a surrogacy agreement and she will have no legal right to the baby after delivery.
During the pregnancy legal work is started with an attorney in the state where the baby will be born. Depending on the state this can be a pre-birth order, post-birth order, voluntary acknowledgement of parentage, judgement of paternity, custody order or adoption. There may be a court date for just your attorney or for you and your surrogate.
Surrogacy is legal in most states except Nebraska, Michigan and Lousiana. There are some states that it may be more difficult for unmarried couples, members of the LBBTQIA+ community, or single parents.
General
The timeline for the process can vary greatly. Once your surrogate is approved at your clinic it will take 4 to 6 months to get to transfer if everything goes smoothly with medical screening and contracts. Transfers also are sadly not always successful and that will present more delays. It is best to be aware that delays can happen. The process can take as little as 14 months or it can take 2-3 years.
No, there will be a legal contract in place and another judge would not be able to overrule it. If this is attempted by the surrogate she can be sued for all money paid out to her during the surrogacy journey. Surrogates look forward to the end of the journey where the parent(s) meets their baby for the first time. Surrogates themselves are also worried that an intend parent can decide they don’t want the baby at the end.
The more contact the better! Expectations for contact is something that should be discussed very early in the process of choosing your surrogate. You want to make sure that you both want the same things. A lot of the time you do not live near your surrogate so frequent contact will make you feel a part of the journey and you will know what is going on in the pregnancy.
No, but in some states the process of obtaining parentage may be more difficult if you are unmarried.
Medical
A traditional surrogate uses her own eggs. This process can be done by either IUI or IVF.
A gestational surrogate will have an embryo transfer procedure where your embryos are implanted in her uterus. There is no genetic connection with a gestational surrogate.
The intended mom or egg donor will have 7-10 days of fertility medication to encourage the growth of multiple eggs. Once there is a good number of mature eggs, she will have an egg retrieval. The eggs are then fertilized with sperm from the intended parent or a sperm donor. They are then grown in the lab to day 5 and then frozen. Most parents will decide to have PGD testing done. In these cases a biopsy is taken from each embryo and sent out for testing to see if it is chromosomally normal.
Your surrogate will start medication to encourage her lining to thicken and to help support the embryo. The embryo transfer involves the lab at your fertility clinic thawing the embryo and loading it into a catheter. Your Reproductive Endocrinologist will perform the transfer procedure and the catheter is passed through the cervix and placed in the uterine lining. The catheter is then removed and check by the lab staff to make sure it is empty.
This will vary depending on your clinic’s protocol. Medication is usually started 4 weeks before the embryo transfer and is continued to 8-10 weeks of pregnancy.
This will vary by clinic but she is usually released from the care of your fertility clinic between 8-10 weeks of pregnancy.
Yes, you are always able to attend approintments at your fertility clinic. Also, the OB will be aware that it is a surrogacy from the beginning and will allow you to attend those visits.
Yes, your surrogate will sign a release when she starts care at her OB that will allow you to talk to the OB with any medical questions you may have on her care.
Your surrogate will have 1 to 3 ultrasounds from 6 to 10 weeks of pregnancy under the care of your fertility clinic.
Once released to her OB she will follow their schedule. Generally there is one at 12 weeks, an anatomy ultrasound at 20 weeks and an ultrasound mid-way through the 3rd trimester to check on the baby’s position. There are sometimes more ultrasounds depending on your surrogates age or if the pregnancy has been deemed high risk or if she is pregnant with multiples.
Logistics
You can visit as often as you would like and as early on in the process that works for everyone. If you will need to spend an extended amount of time in the area your surrogate lives prior to traveling home, it is nice to acclimate yourself to the area ahead of time.
This will depend on how long it will take you to get to your surrogate if she lets you know she is in labor. Babies can come at anytime and sometimes unexpectedly. Some parents, especially if they are international, will come 3 weeks prior to the due date.
It can vary. If there are no complications after delivery your baby will be discharged in about 2 days. You medical team at the hospital will let you know if your baby needs to stay longer.
If you are driving, you can travel home after your baby is discharged from the hospital. You just need to take frequent breaks to take your baby out of the car seat if it is a longer distance than about 2 hours. If you are flying home and live in the US, you will need to follow your airlines guidelines for minimum age for air travel. If you are flying internationally, your baby will need a passport prior to flying home. This process can take at least 2-3 weeks.
This will vary by airline and international flights will require a passport.
Yes, your baby will be issued a US Passport and this will be needed to fly home.