Lock Rekeying in San Rafael

When the locks are fine and the keys are the problem, the answer is a rekey. San Rafael produces that situation constantly. A Dominican house sells after three decades, and the buyer has no idea how many gardeners, housekeepers and painters still carry a copy. A Canal apartment turns over between tenants inside one weekend. A Loch Lomond condo comes back from a year of renters. An owner in Lucas Valley changes property managers and would rather not ask for the old keys back. Marin Lock & Key repins the cylinders already in your doors. The old keys stop working, and nothing on the door looks any different.

The van carries a bench, and that is where the work happens. Each cylinder comes off the door, the plug is pushed out with a follower, the old pins go into a tray, and new pin stacks are loaded to a fresh key. The Kwikset and Schlage on Eichlers and on the newer condos take a few minutes apiece. The original mortise cylinders in Gerstle Park and along Mission Avenue take a rekey too, so long as the plug still turns without catching; if it catches, you hear that before the plug is out. Mailbox locks are the exception, since most are supplied with fixed keys and are swapped rather than repinned. Keys are cut at the van. Every old key is then tried in every repinned lock while you watch, so the change is not taken on faith.

Rekeying is named at $26 to $43 per cylinder. Four cylinders on a house come to $104 to $172. A deadbolt and a knob on a one-bedroom in the Canal come to $52 to $86. The $89 service call is inside the total. Two cylinders at $26 make $52, which is less than the service call, so that visit is named as $89 and stops there. Cylinders in different keyways that cannot share a key are named on the call, and the swap of the odd one is named under lock replacement.

You call and describe the doors: how many, or a photograph of each lock face. The full figure per cylinder and the total are named on that call. The van leaves and calls from the gate, after the text with the name and the window. The receipt repeats the figure: the count is confirmed at the door, the cylinders are pinned, keys are cut, old and new keys are tried on every door, card or tap is taken. A property manager gets a receipt that lists each door under each unit, which is what a turnover file wants.