It used to be that everyone had a landline phone in their home and searching for a number or address was a matter of opening the yellow pages and finding their name. Things have grown more difficult now that cell phones are in common use and many people do not even have landlines, and if they do their number may be unpublished.

Even with the widespread use of caller ID on most landlines, some numbers may appear without an identifying name and there are ways for callers to stop their details from appearing. Reverse phone lookup directories have responded to these changing times to offer a very valuable service to resourceful phone users.

There are two common functions for these directories.

Locating Names

If you are getting calls from someone and only a number is revealed on your caller ID, or you want to figure out cell phone callers, reverse phone lookup directories can help you find out the name registered to the number of concern. Just by entering the number you will have access to whoever is behind the calls of concern.

People needing lookup directories include those wanting to identify a number frequently phoning their spouse or teenager's cell phone, since there is no public directory for cell phone numbers. Others may use lookup directories when they want to know a name registered to a home phone that may be unpublished. Anytime you have a number but aren't sure who it belongs to, a reverse phone lookup service can deliver the information.

Finding Addresses

another common use is to find an address for someone, whether you know the name of the person or not. Once you plug into the information associated with a certain phone number most services will give additional data as well, such as the address of an home phone or an address associated with a cell phone number.

This may not be an everyday need for most people, but it does have its benefits in some situations. For instance, consider a parent desperate to locate a teenager who has run away or is still out well past curfew. If they can get access to numbers from the teenager's belongings or cell phone a reverse phone lookup could quickly tell them addresses and names of locations the teenager may be at that time.

Other circumstances may be looking for addresses to mail out party invitations to your child's classmates. If you have their phone number you can access their address and mail out the invitation without calling or tracking down other busy people.

Lookup directories can also deliver access to other various types of information, like income brackets and previous addresses, and one site even gives a map with an rough pinpoint of where the home or business is located.

There will be a nominal price for any up to date reverse phone lookup service, but if your business or personal life demands certain data it is more than worth the payoff in the end. The fee is unavoidable because this kind of information is not easy or free to research, pull together, and save, so dispensing it on demand to consumers like you must also come with a charge to make up for such working expenditures.

There probably will never be a public directory for cellular numbers, and even if they were compiled it is probable many of the numbers would be unlisted as is the case with many landline numbers today. The best way to gain access to these numbers is to pay a small fee either to complete a one time number search or to join a lookup directory if you will need to access the directory long term.