People in the market for homes care more about cell reception at their new address than they do about access to good schools, a new study says.

According to the RootMetrics’ survey of 2,000 adults in the U.S., 76 percent of respondents said a good mobile phone signal is very or somewhat important when looking at buying or renting a new place, while only 60 percent put school districts on the same level of importance. Access to public transportation scored 42 percent by the same measure.

Of course, almost everyone has a cell phone these days, and not everyone has kids. But the result illustrates just how critical good cell reception has become. Crime statistics, taxes, local amenities and hospitals ranked above cell reception.

The survey also showed that wireless carriers have some work to do. Forty-five percent of mobile phone owners in the study said they experience recurring problems with signal quality at their home.

Some of this can be solved by WiFi calling, available on some Android and iOS devices. But as yesterday’s Comcast outage in Seattle and San Francisco showed, good cell service is an important backup, at least.