With our first adoption, we did the homestudy and the dossier together. In fact, our dossier sat at our placing agency for nearly a month just waiting for our homestudy worker to finally write up her report and mail it!

This time around, we are adopting a very special needs child from a country that generally prefers smaller families. I had a great deal of frustration because our agency refused to help us compile the dossier until they got word from India that we would be permitted to adopt this child, due to our family size. Our thinking was that we would not lose much money in compiling the dossier but would lose time. They thought they were being helpful in waiting before sending the information on (and India has a very strange dossier list, imo). And, part of the delay was that India would not agree to our waiver until they actually saw our current homestudy.

It did end up working out, but it was incredibly frustrating. It did end up costing us a good month in our process, which for our son is significant--given his medical issues. But, we got over it and considered it a small bump in the process ultimately.

So, its not normal to do it that way. But, it does happen sometimes, and for legitimate reasons. If you are not comfortable, then I would recommend looking elsewhere. The relationship you have with your placing agency is going to be the MOST important thing in this process. If you start out feeling like they aren't rooting for you but hindering you, then the resentment may get worse on both sides over time. I'd definitely either have a heart to heart and demand to know why they are acting in this manner OR seek another agency altogether.