Are you thinking about doing surrogacy without an agency? You’re not alone. You might be wondering whether a DIY approach could save time or money. But skipping the agency isn’t as simple as it sounds. While it may seem like a way to streamline your journey, independent surrogacy can bring legal, emotional, and logistical challenges you might not expect.
If you’re considering this path, you deserve to know the full picture. This guide will walk you through what it takes to do surrogacy without an agency, the risks to watch out for, and how you might find a middle ground with independent programs.
Can You Do Surrogacy Without an Agency?
Yes, you can legally pursue surrogacy without an agency in many states. This approach is often referred to as “independent surrogacy” or “private surrogacy.” You may already have someone in mind who’s willing to carry your baby, or you might be planning to start your search on your own. Either way, it’s important to understand the responsibilities that come with managing the journey independently—from legal documentation to emotional support.
But just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s simple. When you choose independent surrogacy, you’re taking on the full weight of the process. You’re responsible for everything—finding a surrogate, coordinating medical appointments, drafting legal contracts, and ensuring everyone meets the necessary qualifications. It’s not just a logistical effort; it’s an emotional one too. Balancing the joy of the journey with the pressure of managing it all can feel overwhelming without professional support.
What You Need to Watch Out For
- Legal Risks: Without a surrogacy attorney or agency to ensure your contract complies with state laws, you risk drafting an agreement that lacks enforceability or omits critical protections, potentially resulting in legal disputes, custody complications, or court intervention.
- Screening Gaps: Without professional screening from an agency, you risk selecting a surrogate who may not meet key medical, psychological, or lifestyle qualifications, which could jeopardize the success and safety of your journey.
- Emotional Labor: When you manage surrogacy on your own, you’re taking on not just logistical responsibilities but a high emotional toll as well—coordinating schedules, resolving misunderstandings, and carrying the pressure of every detail without professional guidance can lead to burnout and chronic stress, especially when compounded by the emotional highs and lows of the fertility journey.
What Does an Agency Do in the Surrogacy Journey?
Agencies play a crucial role in enhancing the safety, structure, and emotional stability of your surrogacy experience by offering expert legal guidance, rigorous surrogate screening, and end-to-end case management, all of which can significantly improve your success rate and reduce stress.
Legal Support and Compliance
Your agency coordinates essential logistics, including appointment scheduling, clinic communications, and insurance arrangements, so you can devote your time and energy to nurturing a meaningful relationship with your surrogate and preparing for parenthood.
Surrogate Screening and Matchmaking
Your agency handles comprehensive screening that includes medical evaluations, psychological assessments, and background checks, ensuring that any surrogate you are matched with is emotionally, physically, and legally prepared to carry your child.
Case Management and Coordination
Your agency coordinates essential logistics, including appointment scheduling, clinic communications, and insurance arrangements, so you can devote your time and energy to nurturing a meaningful relationship with your surrogate and preparing for parenthood.
How Does Surrogacy Work Without an Agency?
Choosing the DIY surrogacy route means you’ll be fully responsible for each component of the process, including locating and vetting a surrogate, hiring and coordinating with legal professionals, managing medical logistics, and negotiating financial arrangements. Without agency support, it’s up to you to ensure that every detail meets legal, ethical, and medical standards to protect all parties involved.
1. Finding a Surrogate
You might search through social media, online forums, or personal referrals to find a surrogate. Without the support of an agency, it’s your responsibility to evaluate her medical history, ensure psychological readiness, and verify her background—tasks that require expertise and attention to detail to avoid significant risks.
2. Handling Legal Work
You’ll be responsible for hiring a surrogacy attorney who can draft comprehensive legal agreements, interpret your state’s complex and evolving surrogacy laws, and ensure that the rights of all parties—including yours, the surrogate’s, and the future child’s—are clearly protected and legally recognized.
3. Managing Medical Appointments
Without agency support, you’re responsible for coordinating with your fertility clinic to arrange all aspects of the surrogate’s medical journey, including initial screenings, the embryo transfer procedure, and ongoing pregnancy monitoring—each of which requires careful planning and consistent communication to avoid delays or missteps.
4. Setting Up Compensation
You’ll be responsible for negotiating payment terms with your surrogate and overseeing the disbursement of funds, often through an independent escrow service. This process requires careful planning and transparency to avoid financial disputes and ensure timely compensation.
Is It Safe to Do Surrogacy Without an Agency?
It can be safe, but only if you’re fully prepared to take on the complete scope of responsibilities—including legal contracts, medical appointments, financial oversight, and emotional well-being—without professional guidance. Independent surrogacy demands expert-level attention to legal, ethical, and procedural details, and any misstep along the way could result in significant delays, unanticipated expenses, or even serious legal setbacks.
Here Are Some Common Risks
- Scams: Online surrogacy groups may include individuals who misrepresent their intentions, request money under false pretenses, or provide inaccurate information about their qualifications, making it essential for you to verify all details and use secure, vetted platforms for communication and matching.
- Unqualified Surrogates: If your surrogate doesn’t pass clinical and psychological screenings—which often evaluate prior pregnancies, mental health history, and lifestyle factors—you could face canceled cycles, wasted medical costs, or months of delay that take a toll on your emotional and financial well-being.
- Oversights: When you’re navigating the surrogacy process alone, it’s easy to overlook critical steps like confirming the surrogate’s prior pregnancy outcomes or ensuring legal documents are state-compliant. These kinds of oversights can lead to failed transfers, delays in establishing parental rights, and costly legal complications.
The safety of your journey depends on how carefully and thoroughly you handle each step.
Is Independent Surrogacy More Affordable?
At first glance, independent surrogacy might seem like a cost-effective alternative due to the absence of agency fees. However, many intended parents find that unforeseen expenses—such as legal corrections, repeat medical screenings, and travel arrangements—can quickly add up, making the overall cost comparable to or even higher than using an agency.
What You’re Actually Saving (or Not)
Agency fees typically cover critical services such as surrogate screening, legal oversight, case management, and logistical coordination. Skipping these can lead to costly mistakes—from mismatched surrogate arrangements and incomplete legal protections to rescheduled medical procedures—all of which can significantly increase your overall expenses.
Where Extra Expenses Come From
- Additional screenings and lab work if a surrogate fails to meet medical or psychological standards
- Escrow account setup, which involves establishing a secure third-party financial arrangement to manage surrogate compensation and reimbursements in a legally compliant and transparent way
- Counseling and emotional support services are essential for navigating the complexities of surrogacy
- Legal fees associated with revising or redrafting contracts to comply with changing circumstances or laws
- Out-of-pocket travel and lodging expenses for appointments, especially if your surrogate lives in another city or state
Ultimately, many intended parents discover that the cumulative cost of legal consultations, repeated screenings, travel, and emotional strain can equal or surpass the all-inclusive support and protection provided by a reputable surrogacy agency.
How Do You Screen a Surrogate Without an Agency?
Thoroughly screening your surrogate is one of the most crucial steps in the surrogacy process because it ensures that she is physically, psychologically, and emotionally qualified to carry a pregnancy safely and responsibly, minimizing risks for all parties involved.
Here’s What You Need to Do:
- Review her complete medical history to identify potential health concerns, complications in previous pregnancies, or underlying conditions that could affect the success of the surrogacy journey.
- Arrange a psychological evaluation to assess her emotional readiness, stability, and motivation for becoming a surrogate, which is essential for navigating the demands of pregnancy and the transfer of parental rights.
- Run criminal and background checks to ensure the surrogate has no history of legal or financial instability, substance abuse, or criminal behavior, all of which could compromise the well-being of the child or the integrity of the surrogacy agreement.
Why Screening on Your Own Is Risky
Unless you know how to accurately assess a surrogate’s medical, psychological, and personal background records, you could easily overlook red flags—such as complications in past pregnancies, signs of untreated mental health conditions, or lifestyle factors that might affect pregnancy viability.
These oversights can lead to failed embryo transfers, legal complications, or unexpected delays that force you to restart the entire matching process, costing valuable time, money, and emotional energy.
To avoid these pitfalls, you’ll also need to work in close collaboration with your fertility clinic to ensure all medical screenings and psychological evaluations are completed to the clinic’s standards and your state’s legal requirements.
Crucially, with agency support, surrogates can be screened before matching, preventing this scenario entirely, a feat that is simply not possible in independent arrangements.
Why Many Parents Come Back to Agencies After Trying DIY Surrogacy
At the outset, you may feel confident managing your surrogacy journey independently. But as complexities arise, many intended parents find that the professional support, structured guidance, and emotional relief offered by an agency are invaluable to navigating the process successfully.
Here’s Why You Might Return to an Agency:
- Peace of Mind: With professionals managing the logistics, legal documents, medical coordination, and communication, you can approach each step of your journey with greater confidence and less stress.
- More Time for What Matters: Instead of juggling schedules and contracts, you can focus your attention on preparing emotionally and practically for parenthood.
- Built-In Safeguards: Agencies anticipate potential challenges and mitigate risks—such as legal oversights, unqualified matches, or communication breakdowns—before they disrupt your process, improving your chances of a smooth and successful outcome.
- Hybrid Flexibility: Some agencies, like American Surrogacy, offer hybrid programs where you can self-match with a surrogate while still receiving professional support for legal, medical, and emotional aspects of the journey—providing a balanced option between full independence and full agency involvement.
Explore Independent Surrogacy Programs
If you’re drawn to the idea of finding your own surrogate but still want the structure and peace of mind that come from working with professionals, you have a flexible solution. For example, American Surrogacy’s Independent Surrogacy Program provides agency-level support while allowing a greater degree of freedom in several aspects of the process, all for a drastically reduced price.
This program empowers you to self-match while benefiting from agency-level support in legal documentation, medical coordination, psychological evaluations, and emotional counseling. This hybrid approach ensures your journey remains safe, efficient, and fully supported every step of the way.
Learn More About Independent Surrogacy Programs
Still Unsure? Let Us Help You Decide
Whether you’re ready to begin your surrogacy journey without an agency or simply gathering information, you’re not alone in navigating these important decisions. Our experienced team is here to answer your questions, provide trusted insight, and help you determine the best path forward for your family.