Money is the last thing couples ask me about and the first thing they decided before they called. I know because of the pause. Somebody asks what a session costs, I say it, and then there is a silence while two people do arithmetic in their heads about a thing they have never bought before and have no reference price for.
So let me take the awkwardness out of it. Here are the real numbers, plainly. Here is what you are actually buying with them, which is not what most people think. And here are the situations where I would tell you to keep your money, because I would rather lose the booking than take it from a couple I cannot help.
The actual numbers
No packages you have to call about, no pricing on request.
In the office, a 50 minute session is $175. A 90 minute session is $315. A 180 minute intensive is $630. By video, a 25 minute session is $87, 50 minutes is $175, 90 minutes is $315, and 120 minutes is $420. There is a 3 session package at $700.
The first conversation is free. It is 25 minutes, it is for first timers rather than existing clients, and it exists so that neither of us spends money finding out we are a bad fit. I do not take insurance, and the reasons for that are worth understanding before you compare on price. I covered them in how to choose who you do this work with.
Why the first session is usually 90 minutes
Fifty minutes is enough to open something and not enough to put it back. The first time two people sit down and say everything out loud, you want room to land it somewhere before you both go home. Almost every couple I see starts with the 90.
What the money actually buys
People think they are buying my opinion. They are not. I am not going home with either one of you, and I have said that in a lot of first sessions to make a point: you are not paying me to settle who is right.
What you are buying is three things. First, a room where the conversation you have been avoiding for two years actually happens, with someone in it whose job is to stop it from becoming the fight that ends things. Most couples cannot get to that conversation alone. Not because they are weak. Because the moment it starts, one of them has to go pick up a child.
Second, you are buying pattern recognition. I have watched hundreds of couples run through the same handful of shapes. You have watched one marriage, from inside, with all the emotion attached. I can usually tell you in the first hour what the loop is, and hearing it named is often the thing that breaks it.
Third, you are buying a deadline. Nothing in a marriage gets attention without one. An appointment on Thursday is a forcing function, and the fact that it cost something is part of why it works.
After the session, I am not going home with either one of you. You are not paying me to decide who is right.
Matthew W. Hoelscher, PCC
The cheaper things, and when they work
I am not going to pretend a paid session is the only thing that helps. Some of the free versions genuinely work, and if one of them is going to work for you, do that instead.
Reading works if the problem is that you do not have language for what is happening. A weekend away works if the problem is exclusively that you have not had four consecutive uninterrupted hours since 2021. Talking to a friend works right up until the friend picks a side, which they will, because they love you.
What none of the free versions do is hold a hard conversation open past the point where one of you wants to leave the room. That is the specific thing you are paying for, and if that is your problem, no amount of reading substitutes for it. There is a broader version of this argument in investing in your relationship.
What you are dealing with
What I would actually do
We are exhausted and have not been alone together in a year.
Book a weekend, not a session. Buy the time first and see what is left after you have slept.
We do not have words for what is going wrong.
Read first. Two people who can name the problem often solve a chunk of it in a kitchen for free.
We have the same fight every week and it never lands anywhere.
That one does not resolve alone. You need a third person, because you have both memorized your parts.
Something happened and neither of us can talk about it.
Do not wait. This is the situation the room exists for, and it gets more expensive with every month it sits.
The number nobody puts beside it
I am not going to quote you a divorce statistic. Every number you have seen on that is either invented or lifted out of context, and I have no interest in scaring anyone into a booking.
What I will say is what I have watched. A divorce is two households where there was one. It is attorneys, on both sides, hourly. It is a custody arrangement that has to be negotiated and then relitigated every time somebody's job changes. It is a decade of holidays that require a schedule. Beside that, a few hundred dollars spent on the possibility of not doing all of that is not a large bet.
That is not an argument that you should stay married. Sometimes the answer is not to. I work through that question honestly with couples in stage 3, stay or go, and if the answer turns out to be go, the money is still not wasted, because getting there deliberately rather than by explosion is the difference in what it costs your kids.
How couples usually structure it
Most people do not buy an open ended commitment, and I would not sell you one.
The common shape is a 90 minute first session where everything gets on the table, then two follow ups over roughly the next 30 days to check what actually changed, deepen it, and hold you both to what you said. A lot of couples are finished there. Some come back six months later for a tune up when something new arrives. Some stay longer because the work goes somewhere deeper, and that is a decision we make together rather than a subscription you got enrolled in.
That short shape is deliberate. The clinical route can run weekly for months by design, and there are situations where it should. But if what you have is two people who can both change and a pattern nobody has named yet, that does not require a year. I lay out the difference, including where coaching is the weaker option, in coaching and the clinical path.
What the spend usually looks like
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The free 25 minute call. Costs nothing, and either of us can end it by deciding this is not a fit.
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A 90 minute first session. Everything on the table, and you leave with one thing to actually do.
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Two follow ups over the next month. This is where whatever you changed either holds or does not.
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A decision point. Most couples stop here. Some keep going. Nobody gets enrolled in anything by default.
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A check in later if you want one. Marriages have new problems. That is not a relapse, it is a Tuesday.
When I would tell you not to spend it
I turn work away and I would rather do it on a free call than after your third session.
Do not spend this money if there is abuse in your marriage, an active addiction, or an untreated mental health condition. That belongs with a licensed professional, and coaching on top of it wastes your money and delays the thing that would actually help. Do not spend it if what you want is for me to fix your spouse while you observe. And do not spend it if one of you has already decided to leave and is booking sessions to be able to say you tried. I will find that out in the first hour anyway, and you will have paid for the privilege.
I will also say the unpopular one. If money is genuinely tight and the marriage is not in crisis, wait. Go do the free versions properly for a month first. A stable marriage that needs attention will still be there in 30 days. That is a different situation from something that just broke, where waiting three weeks to decide costs you more than the session.
Talk it through
The first conversation costs nothing and it is the point of the design. Book a free 25 minute call. It is for first timers. In 25 minutes you will know whether I am the right person, what a first session would go after, and what it would cost. If I am not the right person, I will tell you who is, and that call still costs you nothing.
Questions couples ask
What does a session actually cost?
In the office, 50 minutes is $175, 90 minutes is $315, and a 180 minute intensive is $630. By video, 25 minutes is $87, 50 minutes is $175, 90 minutes is $315, and 120 minutes is $420. There is a 3 session package at $700. The first 25 minute conversation is free for first timers.
Do you take insurance?
No. Insurance generally does not cover work on a marriage anyway, because a marriage is not a diagnosable condition, and billing it usually means diagnosing one partner with something that then lives on a permanent medical record. Paying directly keeps that record clean and keeps the work between the three of us.
How many sessions will we need?
I cannot promise you a number and I would not trust anyone who does. The common shape is a 90 minute first session and two follow ups over the next month, and many couples finish there. Some go longer. What I can promise is that you will not be enrolled in anything by default.
Is coaching cheaper than the clinical route?
Usually it is shorter, which is not the same thing as cheaper per hour. A clinical model that runs weekly for months has a different total than three sessions in 30 days. But you should not pick on price. If there is abuse, addiction or an untreated condition in the picture, the clinical route is the correct one at any price and I will tell you so.