Future Family wants to give women a more affordable option in fertility treatments

In 2016, the scales tipped toward more moms having kids in their 30s than in their 20s for the first time. However, those closer to 40 than 30 face higher risks than their younger counterparts. Add to that one in every eight couples in the U.S., regardless of age, have some type of fertility issue. More couples are now looking at their options with IVF and other fertility treatments.

The problem is those treatments can come with a hefty price tag. The typical costs range from $12,000 to $20,000 for IVF, plus another few thousand for the genetic testing involved to ensure the fetus is chromosomally normal. It’s not something couples with an average salary can afford.

A new Bay Area startup, Future Family, hopes to change that by offering to finance more affordable options — including a newly launched fertility age test you can do in the privacy of your own home to determine how much time you might have left to make a few babies.

The startup was co-founded by former Solar City exec Claire Tomkins and Eve Blossom after Tomkins went through six rounds of IVF and spent more than $100,000 to finally get her baby. It was then she had the idea to create a better way for more women and couples to have more affordable options in planning for the family they wanted.

“The cost is really prohibitive and it was really eye-opening for me,” she told TechCrunch. “I personally hadn’t had any health issues before and what I learned was that it was so expensive that if you don’t have resources you probably couldn’t afford treatment.”

She started hearing from women who’d gone through the same thing she had and decided to do something for them.

But fertility financing isn’t anything new, and most fertility clinics offer some type of financing, combined with whatever your insurance — if you are lucky enough to have good insurance — might cover. A rudimentary search on Google also offers plenty of options advertising affordable financing. However, the startup extends a 24/7 nurse concierge service and zero-down financial packages for IVF and egg freezing, and it aims to find less expensive services to help keep the costs down. The new fertility age test, for instance, will cost $300, or about half the typical cost for the same type of test in the doctor’s office.

A woman freezing her eggs with Future Family could pay as little as $75/month, which includes all clinic costs, medications and storage in the first year, according to the startup. Those looking to go through IVF could pay as little as $125/month, all-inclusive.

And, despite a lot of competition in the space, Future Family may have come at a good time. The baby-making industry has ballooned to nearly $3 billion in the U.S., providing fertile ground for growth.