Adoption Under the Texas Family Code: Termination and Final Decree

Texas adoption requirements start with a single gate: every living biological parent’s rights to the child must be terminated before a judge can finalize an adoption. Beyond that, any adult can petition, but you’ll need to pass criminal and abuse-registry background checks, complete a pre-adoptive home screening, and satisfy the court that adoption serves the child’s best interest. The rules live in Chapter 162 of the Texas Family Code, and the details around consent, termination, and paternity are where most cases stall.

Who Can File to Adopt

Any adult in Texas may petition to adopt a child, so long as the parent-child relationship with each living biological parent has already been terminated or a termination suit is joined with the adoption petition.¹ Single people, married couples, and stepparents all qualify. Texas law does not prohibit same-sex couples from adopting, though private agencies set their own placement policies.

If the petitioner is married, both spouses must join the petition. The non-petitioning spouse is not just consenting; they become a co-petitioner.² In a stepparent adoption, the child’s parent who is married to the petitioner joins the petition, and no separate consent is required from that parent.³

You do not have to live in Texas to adopt a Texas child, but out-of-state families must comply with the Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children (ICPC). Every state has signed on. A caseworker in the child’s state assembles a packet with the child’s social, medical, and educational history; that packet passes through central ICPC offices in both states before a home study is ordered where the family lives.⁴ Plan on extra time.

Background Checks and the Home Screening

Every prospective adoptive parent must obtain their own criminal history record. The court can also accept records supplied by the Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) or a licensed child-placing agency if those records are less than a year old.² For foster-care adoptions, DFPS requires fingerprint-based FBI checks for every prospective parent and every household member age 14 or older.⁵ Fingerprint checks you completed for another job (teaching, nursing, law enforcement) will not satisfy this requirement. You need a fresh set processed through DFPS.

DFPS also runs child abuse and neglect registry checks. If anyone in the household has lived outside Texas within the past five years, an out-of-state abuse and neglect check is required, and this covers not just prospective parents but caregivers, frequent visitors, and babysitters with unsupervised access.⁵ Convictions involving violence, child abuse, or sexual offenses can disqualify an applicant, though courts may weigh rehabilitation and how long ago an offense occurred.

Before the adoption can be granted, a pre-adoptive home screening evaluates whether the home is safe and suitable. DFPS treats this as an assessment of the home’s safety and available space, and every home must meet the Minimum Standards and Guidelines for Child-Placing Agencies.⁶ The screening usually includes interviews with everyone in the household, a physical walk-through of the home, and a look at financial stability. Each prospective parent also needs a physical exam, generally within the past year, with a written statement from the provider confirming physical and mental capacity to care for a child.

Before placement, whoever is placing the child must compile a health, social, educational, and genetic history report on the child. The adoptive family receives this before meeting the child, with identifying information about the birth parents redacted. Grandparent, aunt/uncle, and stepparent adoptions are exempt from the report requirement.⁷

Ending Biological Parents’ Rights

No adoption moves forward until every living biological parent’s legal rights have been terminated, either voluntarily or by court order. Termination is where cases most often stall. The court must find termination supported by clear and convincing evidence, a higher standard than the preponderance-of-evidence rule that applies in most civil cases.

Involuntary Termination Grounds

Texas Family Code Section 161.001 lists more than a dozen grounds for involuntary termination. The most commonly invoked:

Abandonment. Leaving the child with someone else and either expressing no intent to return or staying away at least three months without providing support.
Endangerment. Knowingly placing or leaving the child in conditions that endanger physical or emotional well-being, or engaging in conduct that creates that danger.
Failure to support. Not supporting the child according to the parent’s ability for a full year ending within six months of the petition being filed.
Criminal conduct. Being convicted of, or placed on community supervision for, causing the death or serious injury of a child.

Other grounds include abandoning the mother during pregnancy, being the major cause of a child’s truancy, and refusing to comply with a court order under the Family Code’s investigation provisions.⁸ Incarceration by itself does not automatically end parental rights, but prolonged absence and lack of contact weigh heavily.

Best Interest of the Child

Even when statutory grounds exist, the court must separately find that termination serves the child’s best interest. Judges apply the factors from the Texas Supreme Court’s 1976 decision in Holley v. Adams: the child’s wishes if old enough to express them, the child’s present and future emotional and physical needs, any danger to the child, the parenting ability of the person seeking custody, available support programs, plans for the child, the stability of the proposed home, acts or omissions suggesting the existing relationship is improper, and any excuse for those acts or omissions.⁹ No single factor decides the case, and missing evidence on one factor does not automatically defeat a petition.

Voluntary Relinquishment

When a biological parent agrees to the adoption, they sign an affidavit of voluntary relinquishment. The affidavit cannot be signed sooner than 48 hours after the child’s birth, must be witnessed by two credible persons, and must be verified before someone authorized to take oaths. It has to include identifying information about both parents, a description of the child’s property, and a statement about court-ordered child support.¹⁰

Revocability depends entirely on who is named. If the affidavit designates DFPS or a licensed child-placing agency as managing conservator, the relinquishment is irrevocable the moment it’s signed. If it designates anyone else, such as a specific prospective adoptive parent, it is revocable unless the affidavit expressly states it is irrevocable for a set period of up to 60 days. A revocable affidavit that doesn’t specify irrevocability can be revoked within 10 days of signing.¹⁰

Once a termination order is signed, it becomes nearly bulletproof after six months. After that, the order cannot be challenged through direct or collateral attack, and challenges to an unrevoked affidavit are limited to fraud, duress, or coercion.¹¹

The Paternity Registry Deadline

An unmarried father who wants notice of adoption or termination proceedings must register with the Texas paternity registry. The window is short. He has to register either before the child’s birth or within 31 days after birth.¹² Missing that deadline can mean losing the right to be notified of the case.

There are two exceptions. A man who has already established a legal father-child relationship under Texas law, or who files a paternity suit before the court terminates his rights, is entitled to notice whether or not he registered.¹² Short of those steps, failing to register is one of the fastest ways to lose any voice in the outcome.

The Adoption Hearing and Final Decree

Once termination is complete, or joined with the adoption suit, the case moves to a formal adoption hearing. The court appoints an amicus attorney or guardian ad litem to represent the child. That person makes home visits, interviews household members, reviews financial and medical records, and reports findings to the judge.

If the child is 12 or older, the child must consent to the adoption, either in writing or in open court. A judge can waive that requirement only if doing so serves the child’s best interest. Unless the petitioner is already the managing conservator, the managing conservator’s written consent must also be filed; if that consent is refused without good cause, the court can waive it after a hearing.³

The court cannot grant the petition until it has received the child’s health, social, educational, and genetic history report, signed by the adoptive parents, along with a DFPS acknowledgment of receipt where applicable.² The judge reviews the reports, hears testimony, and decides whether the adoption is in the child’s best interest. If it is, the judge signs the final decree.

The decree permanently severs the child’s legal ties to the biological parents and transfers full parental rights to the adoptive parents. The child is entitled to a new birth certificate with the adoptive parents’ names. To get one, work with your attorney and the district clerk to send a completed Certificate of Adoption (Form VS-160) and a certified copy of the final decree to the Texas Department of State Health Services, which will file the new birth record.¹³

Post-Adoption Contact Agreements

Some adoptive and biological families want ongoing contact after finalization. A post-adoption contact agreement can spell out the type of contact (letters, phone calls, in-person visits), how often, and for how long. A judge has to approve it, and will only do so if enforcing it serves the child’s best interest.

Enforcement is limited. The terms of a post-termination contact order included in a termination decree are generally not enforceable by contempt, so a biological parent’s practical leverage is narrow even when the agreement is on paper. A failure to honor a contact agreement can never be used to undo the adoption itself. Because children’s needs shift as they grow, agreements that build in flexibility tend to hold up better than rigid schedules set when a child is an infant.

Costs and Financial Help

Adoption costs stack up quickly: attorney fees, court filing costs, home study fees, and travel. Two programs offset a chunk of it.

Texas Adoption Assistance

Children adopted from Texas foster care who meet the state’s definition of “special needs” may qualify for ongoing assistance, including Medicaid and monthly payments. DFPS treats a child as having special needs if, at the time the adoptive placement agreement is signed, at least one of these applies:

The child is at least six years old.
The child is at least two and belongs to a racial or ethnic group that exits foster care at a slower rate.
The child is being adopted with a sibling or to join one already in the home.
The child has a verified physical, mental, or emotional disability.
The child has been found eligible for Supplemental Security Income.

Monthly payments are capped at $400 for children at the Basic service level and $545 at Moderate, Specialized, or Intense service levels. DFPS also reimburses up to $1,200 per child for one-time expenses like attorney fees and court costs.¹⁴ If you accept the maximum monthly payment, you cannot later request an increase or appeal the amount, so negotiate carefully at the start.

Federal Adoption Tax Credit

The federal adoption tax credit reimburses qualified adoption expenses, including court costs, attorney fees, and travel. For 2025, the maximum credit was $17,280 per eligible child, with the credit beginning to phase out at a modified adjusted gross income of $259,190 and disappearing entirely at $299,190.¹⁵ These figures adjust each year for inflation. Families adopting a child with special needs can claim the full credit regardless of actual expenses, without documenting spending up to the cap.

Choosing an Adoption Path

Texas families generally pursue adoption through one of three routes, each with different costs, timelines, and support levels.

Agency Adoption

A licensed child-placing agency handles matching with birth parents, screens expectant mothers for medical history and commitment, coordinates prenatal care, arranges or conducts the home study, and provides counseling throughout. Some agencies offer financial protection if a placement falls through. Full-service agencies cost more, and you give up some direct control.

Independent Adoption

An independent adoption works through an adoption attorney rather than an agency. The family does its own networking to find an expectant mother, arranges its own home study, and coordinates counseling separately. It can cost less and give more control, but screening medical history and gauging commitment is harder without agency infrastructure, and fraud protection is usually limited.

Foster Care Adoption

Adopting from Texas foster care through DFPS is the least expensive path and carries the assistance benefits described above. Children in foster care are already in state custody with biological parents’ rights terminated or in the process of being terminated. The process can be lengthy, parental rights are sometimes contested, and children may have trauma histories that call for specialized support.

Whichever path you choose, every Texas adoption ends in court with a final decree. Background checks, home screening, termination of parental rights, and judicial approval apply across the board.

1
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 162.001 – Who May Adopt and Be Adopted
2
Justia Law. Texas Family Code Chapter 162 – Adoption
3
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 162.010 – Consent Required
4
American Public Human Services Association. Interstate Compact on the Placement of Children FAQs
5
Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. Background Checks FAQ – CPS Foster and Adoptive Homes
6
Texas Department of State Health Services. Foster Care and Adoptive Home Study
7
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 162.005 – Preparation of Health, Social, Educational, and Genetic History Report
8
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 161.001 – Involuntary Termination of Parent-Child Relationship
9
Justia Law. Holley v Adams
10
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 161.103 – Affidavit of Voluntary Relinquishment of Parental Rights
11
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 161.211
12
State of Texas. Texas Family Code FAM 160.402 – Registration for Notification
13
Texas Department of State Health Services. New Birth Certificate Based on Adoption
14
Texas Department of Family and Protective Services. Adoption Assistance – DFPS
15
Internal Revenue Service. Tax Benefits for Parents and Families