I keep at least one hard-wired land line phone because the wireless land lines are no good in a power outage. A cell phone would work until you ran out of battery power, and if the power goes out just before your phone needs a recharge you'd be stuck. I babysit for a friend who has no land line, and have to be sure and bring my cell phone well-charged lest I end up with an emergency and no phone, or in case she wants to call me to check on the kids and panics. You can tell I'm still getting used to cell phones.