Direct Skip is a pay-per-hit skip tracing service for property owners that advertises specials as low as 6 cents per hit, 10 to 11 cents per hit after that, and up to 10 phones per owner, on its sign-up page at directskip.com in October 2026. The model is simple and investor-friendly. For a call center it raises one question the price does not answer: what a single hit costs you after it reaches the dialer.
Disclosure: Scout Data is our product; treat that mention as a maker's pitch and the rest as our honest read.
What Direct Skip says it sells
directskip.com forwards to a single sign-up page, and that page is the whole public offer. As read in October 2026, it says:
- “Only pay for hits, avg. 98% hit rate.” The 98% is Direct Skip's own average, not an independent figure.
- “Main Contact - Up to 10 phones and 2 emails plus Relatives Contacts Info.”
- “Corporates/LLCs/Trusts - Highest hit % on the market.”
- “Additional Specials as low as 6 cents/hit,” with 11 and 10 cents per hit “after that.”
- A free account with 500 free records and unlimited searching.
There is no published pricing page with tier sizes, no product documentation, and the page's footer carries a 2021 copyright line. Treat every rate above as a starting point to confirm in writing.
Pay per hit, then pay per dial
Paying only for hits is a real advantage over tracers that bill every record submitted, especially on old or messy input files. But a hit is the tracer's unit, not the dialer's. On Direct Skip's own figures, a 10,000-address list at a 98% hit rate and 10 cents per hit costs about $980, and can return up to ten phones per owner plus relatives' numbers. A floor then has to work out which of those numbers reaches the owner, and every wrong one is a paid agent minute.
That is why the price per hit and the price per conversation drift apart. A file with one owner-matched mobile per row asks an agent for one dial to find out; a file with up to ten numbers per row can ask for ten. The difference between a match rate and a right-party rate is worked through in what a phone match rate means.
Five questions before a bulk order
- How many hits does each special cover? The page lists 6, 10 and 11 cents per hit but not the volume at each rate.
- What counts as a hit? One phone of any kind, or a phone for the owner on title? A relative's number alone?
- How are the numbers ordered? With up to 10 phones per owner, ask whether the first is the most likely owner mobile and whether phone type is flagged.
- Is anything scrubbed? The sign-up page does not mention Do Not Call or litigator scrubbing as of October 2026. If it is not done, that step, and its cost, is yours; see what a litigator list is.
- What happens to dead numbers? Paying per hit does not refund a hit whose numbers are disconnected unless the vendor says so.
Alternatives, by what you are actually buying
More per-hit tracing with a published card. If the per-hit model suits you and you want rates you can read in full, other investor tracers publish theirs; how they compare is in Skip Genie alternatives and, for a pay-as-you-go credit card, in PrimeTracers alternatives.
Bulk tracing through an API. Teams appending phones to tens of thousands of rows a month usually move to a bulk or API vendor with volume pricing and documentation; bulk skip tracing covers that workflow end to end.
A finished calling file. A call center that has to find the homeowners as well as their phones is buying a list, not a trace. Scout Data is in this category: it builds homeowner lists from county records, permits and aerial imagery, matches mobile numbers to the owner on title, scrubs the file against the Do Not Call registry and replaces dead numbers. For full-service data, it is one monthly rate quoted after the free test batch.
Pricing mentions on this page are publicly advertised figures at the time of writing (October 2026), and the cost example uses Direct Skip's own advertised rate and hit rate — confirm current pricing with Direct Skip, and with our sales team for Scout Data.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Direct Skip charge per record?
Direct Skip charges per hit, not per record submitted: its sign-up page advertised specials “as low as 6 cents/hit” and 10 or 11 cents per hit after that, as seen on directskip.com in October 2026. The page does not show how many hits a special covers, so ask for the tier sizes before a large order.
Does Direct Skip have a free trial?
Yes. As of October 2026, Direct Skip offers a free account with 500 free records and unlimited searching. Use the 500 records on addresses whose owners you can verify, so you learn how often the first number reaches the owner, not just how often a hit comes back.
What counts as a hit in skip tracing?
A hit is a record the tracer returns contact data for. It does not by itself mean the number reaches the owner, is a mobile, or is safe to call. Direct Skip's hit carries up to 10 phones and 2 emails for the main contact plus relatives' contact info, so one hit can put many numbers in front of a dialer.