Home Locksmith Services in St. Johns County: DIY Tips and When to Call a Pro
The Keys Maker is a certified, licensed and insured professional home locksmith available in all of St. Johns County including Ponte Vedra Beach, Nocatee, St. Augustine, Crescent Beach and Hastings. The Keys Maker offers all basic home locksmith services such as rekey, installation, repairs and lockout assistance. St. Johns County business license No. B.L1101834.
Some of the lock troubles are easily solved by homeowners in minutes while others require professionals to avoid unnecessary expenses. Below you will find a guide to solve simple problems yourself and to know what to do when the issue is difficult to resolve.
Sea salt and locks
If you live east of the Intracoastal, on Vilano, Anastasia Island, St. Augustine Beach or along A1A in Ponte Vedra, sea salt is a major factor that wears out your locks. Hardware gets pitted, springs corrode and the deadbolt that worked smoothly in March starts grinding by September.
DIY: clean exterior hardware with a damp cloth every month and apply dry lubricant to the keyway and latch two times a year. Apply graphite or Teflon-based dry lube rather than oil, because it attracts dust and dirt. When you buy new locks for beach property choose stainless steel or lifetime PVD finished hardware; brass and bronze locks do not last long near the ocean.
Call us when your key sticks halfway, the cylinder feels gritty despite any efforts or the finish of your locks gets pitted. Corroded cylinder can be changed in the same lock housing and worn beach deadbolt can be easily replaced in twenty minutes.
Doors stuck after a rainy week
When wood door swells in high humidity the latch or bolt cannot line up with the strike plate. Then people start slamming, the strike plate starts wobbling and the door becomes impossible to lock.
DIY: open the door and try to move the handle upwards. If it moves it means that the upper hinge wobbles and needs to be fixed. Simply replace one short screw in this hinge with three-inch screw into the frame. If the bolt just misses the strike plate loosen the strike plate, move it closer to the bolt and tighten again.
Call us if the door has become so low that the bolt cannot reach it, if the frame is cracked at the strike plate or if the deadbolt binds with the door open. It means that the lock needs to be repaired or replaced.
Keys that do not work properly
Key that requires jiggling is probably a copy of a copy and each copy drifts a little bit from the original. After two-three generations the cuts become inaccurate.
DIY: order a spare key cut directly from the original and not from your existing spare. Examine your key against the straightedge; bent key will not fit. If you use Kwikset SmartKey locks and have one working key you can change the lock yourself using the reset tool included in the lock package.
Call us if you have lost all your keys, if you need to have the front door, garage entry and lanai door opened with one key regardless of the brand, or if the key turns but the bolt does not move. In this case you have a damaged tailpiece or cam and it requires repair rather than rekeying.
Locked out
Locked out situation happens always at the worst hour. The Keys Maker answers 24/7 and comes to your address at any moment whether it is condo on the Bridge of Lions side of downtown or a house on the dirt road in Elkton.
DIY first: try the keypad in the garage because this door is usually unlocked and check the lanai slider. If you use a smart lock it may be opened from your phone via the app. Do not break the window or kick the door. A kicked jamb turns a lockout into a repair.
Call us for further help. We will pick or bypass the lock and it will function perfectly after; drilling is an extreme measure which we discuss before doing it.
Move in a house in St. Johns County
Any house changes hands with keys you can’t account for: sellers’ spares, lockbox, cleaners, lawn crew, the neighbor who watched the dog.
New build houses in Nocatee, SilverLeaf, Shearwater and Trailmark need it too. The builder’s construction key and a dozen of trades passed through the front door before you moved in. Old houses in Lincolnville and historic downtown St. Augustine may have mortise locks installed in the 1920s; we can rekey and service them without changing the hardware.
Rekeying is the way to secure your locks and it takes ten minutes per door. Contact us the week you close.
Vacation rentals at the beach
If you rent a place on St. Augustine Beach, Vilano or Crescent Beach, physical keys disappear with guests. Keypad deadbolt with unique code per reservation is the solution; smart versions can synchronize and expire codes from your rental management website.
DIY: change batteries of the keypad every six months, store the mechanical override key away from the lockbox on the porch and test the code before check-in. Contact us to install and program the lock, to rekey after lost key and for the guest who called at 11 PM from A1A locked out.
Hurricane season
Before the hurricane lock all the sliders with a foot bolt or a pin, not just the factory latch and make sure that each exterior door has a deadbolt with a full throw. After the hurricane do not force a lock that took water. Pins corrode and break, and repair becomes more expensive. Contact us and we will flush what is possible to save and change the rest.
The areas we serve in St. Johns County
Ponte Vedra Beach, Palm Valley, Nocatee, Sawgrass, St. Johns, Julington Creek, Switzerland, World Golf Village, Palencia, St. Augustine, Vilano Beach, St. Augustine Beach, Crescent Beach, Hastings and Elkton. We also serve Duval, Clay, Nassau and Baker counties.
Common Questions
How often should I replace my locks in the beach house?
Locks with regular cleaning and dry lube will work years; bare brass near the water becomes pitted in two-three seasons.
Do you rekey mortise locks?
Yes. Most of the early-1900s mortise locks can be rekeyed and serviced. We also cut keys for them.
Should I rekey or replace after a break-in?
Rekey the undamaged locks and replace everything that was forced as well as strike plates and jambs.
Contact The Keys Maker
Locked out anywhere in St. Johns County? Contact us anytime. For rekeys, new hardware, keypad locks or slider locks contact us and we will give you a quote and schedule a visit.
