Most people who find this page typed something like relationship counseling in Miami into a search bar at an hour they are not proud of. So let me answer the practical questions first and save you the scrolling. I am Matthew Hoelscher. I am a coach, an ICF PCC, not a licensed clinician, and I work with couples from an office at 12755 SW 116th Terrace in Kendall and by video anywhere in Florida and all 50 states and DC. The phone is 305.986.2905.
The first conversation is free and it is 25 minutes. It is for people who have never worked with me, and its only job is to figure out whether I am the right person for what is going on in your house. If I am not, I will tell you on that call and point you somewhere better. I would rather do that in 25 minutes than take your money for a session that was never going to fit.
Who actually calls me in Miami
The couple I see most often is 7 to 10 years in with kids under 5. Both of them are competent. Both of them are exhausted. Nobody has been unfaithful and nobody has said the word divorce out loud, but somewhere in the last 3 years they turned into two people running a household together with real efficiency and almost no contact. That is the center of my practice, and it is the group that most often assumes they do not qualify for help.
The second group is in a bad place already. Something surfaced, or a fight went somewhere it cannot come back from on its own. Those calls arrive at odd hours and they usually start with an apology for calling at an odd hour. The third group has nothing wrong at all and wants to get deliberate about connection, conflict and desire before something breaks. They get more out of an hour than anybody, and almost nobody books it. I break all 3 down honestly in who I actually work with.
I also work with couples at every stage, not only married parents of toddlers. Dating seriously, engaged, years in, going through a move or a job loss or an illness in the family, staring down an empty house, or newly retired and discovering that being together all day is a different marriage than the one you had. Domestic couples have marriage problems. I do not care how they file their taxes.
What the first call usually sounds like
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We are good parents and terrible partners right now.
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We do not fight. That is sort of the problem.
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I found something on his phone and I do not know what to do with the next 48 hours.
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We have not had a real conversation since the twins were born.
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She says she is done. I do not think she means it, but I am not sure anymore.
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Nothing is wrong. We just do not want to end up like our friends.
The office in Kendall
The main office is in Kendall at 12755 SW 116th Terrace, Miami, FL 33186. If you are coming from Pinecrest, Doral, Coral Gables, Brickell or south toward Homestead, you know the Palmetto better than I do, so build in the buffer you already build in for everything else.
The room is a room. There is no clipboard, no intake battery, no waiting area with pamphlets about grief. Two people and a coach, sitting close enough to actually talk. That is the setup, and it is deliberate. The environment tells couples a lot in the first 30 seconds about what kind of hour this is going to be.
Two ways couples work with me
Pick the one that fits your week
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In the Kendall office
Best for the first session if you can manage it, and for the longer 90 and 180 minute intensives. Being in the same room changes what two people are willing to say.
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Video, anywhere
Florida, all 50 states and DC. This is how a large share of my work happens now, and it is not a lesser version. It is the version parents of small children can actually attend.
I want to be blunt about the video question because people ask it apologetically. Video is not the discount option. For a couple with 2 kids under 5, video is often the only format that survives contact with real life. Nobody has to arrange a sitter, nobody loses 90 minutes to the drive, and I get to see you in the house where all of this is actually happening. Half the sessions I run are on a screen and I have no complaints about the results.
What the free 25 minute call is actually like
It is a conversation, not a sales call, and it is not a session. I am doing 3 things: finding out what is going on, telling you honestly whether coaching is the right route for it, and if it is, telling you what working together would look like.
The 25 minutes
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You tell me what is happening, in whatever order it comes out
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I ask a few questions, mostly about how long this has been true and what changed
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I tell you plainly whether this is coaching work or belongs with a licensed professional
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If it is coaching work, I tell you what the first session would go after
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You decide later, not on the call. Nobody books under pressure in my practice.
You do not both have to be on it. Plenty of people make that call alone, in a parked car, because it is the only place nobody can hear them. That is fine and it is common. What I will not do is coach one of you on tactics for managing the other, and I will say that on the call too.
What sessions cost
Published plainly, because hunting for a price is its own kind of stress.
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 also a 3 session package at $700.
I do not take insurance, because coaching is not a billable clinical service and I am not going to pretend otherwise. If insurance coverage is essential to you, that points toward the clinical route and I will say so.
Coaching or the clinical route
The honest version of this comparison lives in marriage therapy vs marriage coaching, and it is worth reading before you choose. The short form is that a licensed clinician diagnoses and treats conditions, and I do not do either. What I do is work in the present, on the live problem, with homework between sessions and a bias toward the smallest change you can make this week.
Betrayal, for the record, is coaching work in my practice and I handle it constantly. It is a relational injury, not automatically a clinical one. What it needs is speed, structure and somebody in the room who will not let the first 3 conversations turn into the fight that ends the marriage.
When I will refer you out
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Abuse of any kind
Physical, sexual or emotional. Safety is not a coaching conversation and I will not treat it like one.
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An active addiction
Until that is being treated, marriage work is building on sand and both of you will end up blaming the wrong thing.
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An untreated mental health condition
If depression, an anxiety disorder or anything similar is driving the pattern, a licensed professional leads. I am glad to work alongside that, not instead of it.
What is different about coaching couples in this city
Miami couples come from everywhere, and that shows up in the room constantly. Two people raised on different assumptions about how much say the family gets, how money moves between generations, what a mother in law is entitled to, how loud a disagreement is allowed to be before somebody has crossed a line. My own wife is Argentine, so I have opinions about this that were earned rather than read.
The second thing is the pace. This is a city where a lot of people are building something, and building something has a way of consuming the exact hours a marriage needs to stay alive. The couples I see are rarely lazy. They are over committed, and the marriage is the only thing on the list that never complains until it does.
Third, the schools and the commutes and the extended family living 12 minutes away mean most couples here have almost no unscheduled time together. That is not a character flaw. It is a logistics problem that quietly becomes an intimacy problem, which is most of what the parent marriage is about.
The couples I see are rarely lazy. They are over committed, and the marriage is the only thing on the list that never complains until it does.
Matthew W. Hoelscher, PCC
Talk it through
If any of that sounded like your house, book the free 25 minute call or call 305.986.2905. It is for first timers, it costs nothing, and the only thing I am trying to establish is whether I am the right person for what is actually happening. If you want to know who you would be sitting across from first, that is on my about page.
Questions couples ask
Where is your office in Miami?
12755 SW 116th Terrace, Miami, FL 33186, which is Kendall. I work by video with couples anywhere in Florida and across all 50 states and DC. The phone is 305.986.2905.
Is the first call really free?
Yes, and it is 25 minutes. It is for people who have never worked with me, not for existing clients, and its only purpose is to find out whether coaching is the right route for what is happening. If it is not, I will tell you and point you toward a licensed professional.
Do you take insurance?
No. Coaching is not a billable clinical service and I am not going to dress it up as one. If insurance coverage is a requirement for you, that is a strong signal you want the clinical route, and that is a perfectly good decision to make.
Can we do this by video if we live outside Miami?
Yes. I work by video with couples throughout Florida and in all 50 states and DC. For parents of small children it is frequently the only format that actually happens week after week, and the results hold up. If you are local and can get to Kendall for the first session, I will usually suggest it, but it is not a requirement.
What if only one of us wants to do this?
Come anyway. A lot of people start alone. We work on your half of the pattern, which is the only half you control, and in my experience the other partner joins within a few sessions once they see this is a conversation rather than a trial. What I will not do is coach you on strategies for managing your spouse.