Delaware Adoption Laws: What Title 13 Actually Requires

Delaware's adoption law is contained in Title 13 of the Delaware Code. Chapter 9 governs adoption of minors and adults. Chapter 11 covers termination and transfer of parental rights. If you are adopting in Delaware, these chapters are not background reading — they are the framework that controls every decision your agency, the court, and the Division of Family Services (DFS) will make.

Most free resources will point you to the statutes but will not explain what they mean in practice. Here is what Title 13 actually requires.

Who Can Adopt in Delaware

Under 13 Del. C. § 903, a petition for adoption may be filed by any person who is:

• Over 21 years of age, and
• A resident of Delaware, or a person with whom a child has been placed by a licensed Delaware agency.

Delaware does not require petitioners to be married. Unmarried individuals, married couples, and cohabiting couples — defined as adults of the same or opposite sex who hold themselves out as a couple and regularly reside together — may all petition to adopt. This is a meaningful legal distinction for LGBTQ+ families and long-term partners who are often uncertain whether they qualify under language designed around traditional marriage.

There is no income minimum written into the statute, but the home study process includes a financial assessment to confirm that the family can support a child.

The Six-Month Supervision Requirement

Section 913 sets out the residency and supervision requirements before a petition can be filed:

• Agency or DFS placements: The child must be supervised by the agency for at least six months before the petition for adoption can be filed.
• Stepparent and kinship adoptions: The child must have resided with the petitioner for at least one year before the petition is filed. However, the Family Court has discretion to waive the one-year requirement in cases involving close blood relatives or when other circumstances make early filing appropriate.

These waiting periods are not procedural formalities. They are deliberate "permanency stability" checkpoints built into the statute. Understanding them before your placement keeps you from building your timeline around a filing date that is months earlier than legally possible.

Consent Rules Under Title 13

Who Must Consent

Consent to adoption must be obtained from:

• Each living parent whose parental rights have not been legally terminated
• The child, if they are 14 years of age or older (Form 159)
• The licensed agency or DFS, if they are the legal custodian

Consent must be in writing, notarized, and taken by a judge, an authorized agency representative, or a designated attorney.

The 14-Day Revocation Window

Delaware has no mandatory waiting period before a birth parent can sign consent — consent can be executed any time after the child is born. However, once signed, the birth parent has a 14-day window to revoke that consent in writing. After 14 days, consent is generally irrevocable unless the birth parent can prove in court that it was obtained through fraud or duress.

This 14-day period is one of the most misunderstood rules in Delaware adoption. Families sometimes receive a child, reach day 13 and assume the consent is locked in — it is not until day 15. The emotional weight of that two-week window is significant. Going into placement knowing exactly what the law says helps.

Putative Fathers and the Paternity Registry

If the birth father is not married to the mother and is not named on the birth certificate, Delaware law still requires that he receive notice of any adoption or TPR proceeding — provided the child is over one year old, or he has registered with the Delaware Paternity Registry (maintained by the Office of Vital Statistics). A registered father whose rights have not been terminated must consent to the adoption. An unregistered father of a child under one year who has not established a relationship with the child may lose standing to contest the adoption.

Termination of Parental Rights (TPR)

Adoption cannot proceed until the child is legally free — meaning parental rights have been either voluntarily relinquished or involuntarily terminated by the Family Court.

Grounds for involuntary termination under 13 Del. C. § 1103 include:

• Abandonment: Intentional abandonment for six months (for children over six months old), or failure to maintain contact and pay expenses for an infant under six months
• Failure to plan: When a child has been in state care for 12 months or more and the parent has not completed their case plan or demonstrated a willingness to assume custody
• Prior involuntary TPR: If the parent's rights to another child were previously terminated involuntarily
• Felony convictions: Specific violent crimes against children or the child's other parent
• Unexplained serious injury or death: If a child in the parent's care suffered serious injury or died due to reckless conduct

A contested TPR is one of the most significant causes of delay in Delaware adoptions. If a biological parent disputes the termination, the case goes to trial — which typically adds six months to a year to the overall timeline.

What Changed: 2020–2025 Amendments

Delaware's adoption statutes are not static. Several refinements between 2020 and 2025 affect families today:

Inheritance rights clarification (§ 920): Upon finalization, an adopted child acquires full inheritance rights from the adoptive parents and their relatives, and loses all rights to inherit from biological parents — except in stepparent adoptions where the biological parent remains married to the adopting parent.

Vital records modernization (HB 160): Amendments to Title 16 allow birth certificates to be amended for gender identity for both adoptees and parents without requiring a separate court order. This streamlines what was previously a secondary administrative proceeding.

Birth certificate process: Upon finalization, the Clerk of Court notifies the Delaware Division of Public Health, Office of Vital Statistics, which seals the original birth certificate and issues a new one naming the adoptive parents.

The Effect of Finalization

Once the Family Court judge signs the Final Order of Adoption (Form 152), the legal relationship is permanent and absolute. Under Delaware law, the adopted child is treated "as if born to" the adoptive parents from that point forward. The birth parents' rights and obligations are permanently extinguished — including child support obligations and inheritance rights.

This is not a conditional or modifiable legal relationship. Delaware does not have a statute that makes Post-Adoption Contact Agreements (PACAs) legally enforceable, which means that if an open adoption agreement is made with birth parents, it exists as a good-faith arrangement, not an enforceable contract.

What the Law Leaves Unanswered

Title 13 tells you the rules. It does not tell you how to navigate the DFS Permanency Planning Committee process, which forms to file in which county courthouse, how to choose between the eight licensed agencies, or what the "all-in" cost of each pathway looks like.

The Delaware Adoption Process Guide addresses those practical gaps — including the full document checklist for the Family Court petition, a breakdown of actual costs by pathway, and guidance on what to expect at each stage of the six-month supervision period.

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