Keyed alike means every lock it applies to opens with the same key, set up during a rekey for a small extra cost since a technician is already on site. It only works when the locks share a compatible keyway; mixing brands sometimes means swapping a cylinder or two to match before it can be…
If you have lost a house key and cannot find it, rekey the affected door as soon as you reasonably can — not because losing a key is rare, but because you cannot know where it ended up. A lost key with your address on a tag or a fob is a worse version of…
Before anyone arrives: ask for a total price range on the phone, ask if they will need to drill anything, and check the vehicle for a company name rather than a plain unmarked car. A locksmith who avoids answering any of those three is worth cancelling on, even mid-conversation. You are letting a stranger with…
Bring a photo ID and something that shows the address is yours — a piece of mail, a utility bill, a lease, or a driver’s licence with the matching address. If you cannot produce anything on the spot, we can usually still verify ownership another way, but expect it to take longer and expect us…
No, not for a standard house lockout. Picking or bypassing a normal residential lock leaves no mark and the lock still works with your existing key afterwards. Drilling is a last resort on damaged, high-security, or already-broken locks, and any locksmith should tell you before they do it, not after. This is the question people…
A door that slams shut behind you locks because the latch is spring-loaded and engages on its own — you do not need to turn a key for that to happen. Deadbolts do not self-lock, so if you were only relying on the handle latch, this is the most common way people end up locked…
If a child or pet is locked inside and you are outside, call us and say so when you ring — it changes how the call is handled. Do not force a window or door yourself while you wait; forcing entry is slower than it looks and risks hurting whoever is on the other side…
A spare key under the mat or in a fake rock is the single worst thing you can do for your security — burglars check those spots first and it takes them seconds. A wall-mounted key safe with a changeable code, bolted into masonry rather than siding, is the sensible version. So is leaving a…
Rekeying solves exactly one problem: it stops old keys working. It does not make the door harder to kick, and most break-ins are not key-based. If you want the door to be genuinely harder to get through, the strike plate and frame matter far more than the cylinder, and they cost about thirty dollars. People…
When a partner or housemate moves out, rekey the doors they had keys to. Whether you can do it depends on whose name is on the deed or lease, not on who moved out. If there is any safety concern, that changes the priority and there are people better placed than a locksmith to advise…