Rekeying and replacing solve two different problems. People are told to replace when a rekey would do, because a new lock is a bigger sale, and told to rekey when the hardware is finished, because it is a quicker visit. Neither serves you. The test is simple: is the problem who has a key, or is the problem the lock?
What a rekey actually is
Inside a pin-tumbler lock is a row of pins cut to match one key. A rekey takes the cylinder out, replaces those pins with a set cut to a new key, and puts it back. The lock, the lever, the deadbolt and the door are untouched; the old keys stop working; you get new ones. It is done on site in minutes per lock, and it costs a fraction of a new lock because there is no hardware in it.
When rekeying is the right call
- You moved in. A house or a leased space arrives with an unknown number of keys in circulation — the previous owner, their agent, the cleaner, a neighbor. Rekeying the day you take possession closes all of them at once, and the locks that came with the place are usually fine.
- A key is lost, or somebody left. A lost key, a former employee, a contractor who never returned theirs, a tenant moving out. Nothing is wrong with the lock; the wrong people have keys to it.
- You want one key for every door. If the locks are the same brand and keyway, they can be rekeyed alike so one key opens all of them. That is a rekey, not a replacement, and it is one of the best-value things we do.
- You want a master key system. A landlord or a manager carries one key that opens every unit while each tenant's key opens only theirs. On compatible cylinders that is pinning, not new hardware.
- The keys are being copied. Moving to a restricted keyway — one where blanks are sold only through the dealer and a duplicate needs authorization — is a cylinder change on most commercial hardware, not a whole new lock.
When the lock has to go
- It is worn. The key sticks or has to be jiggled, the latch does not retract fully, the lever droops, the deadbolt binds halfway. Pins are not the problem; the mechanism is. Rekeying a worn lock is money spent twice.
- It was damaged. A kick-in, a pry mark, a cylinder drilled out after a lockout. Bent hardware does not rekey.
- It is the wrong grade for the door. Locks are graded for duty. A light residential knob on the busy back door of a restaurant will not last, and the fix is a commercial-grade lever or deadbolt, not new pins in the old one.
- It cannot be rekeyed. Some inexpensive locks have no serviceable cylinder, and locks of different brands with different keyways cannot be keyed alike, so getting to one key sometimes means replacing the odd one out.
- You are upgrading. A keypad or a smart lock, an electronic deadbolt, a lever in place of a knob for a hand that cannot grip, or a deadbolt on a door that never had one. That is new hardware by definition.
- The door will not latch. Sometimes the lock is blamed for the door. A door that has dropped or a strike that has shifted stops the bolt from throwing; that is a door repair, and no lock fixes it.
The commercial shortcut
Buildings that turn keys over often — offices with staff changes, multi-tenant buildings — use interchangeable-core cylinders. A control key pulls the core out of the lock and a new one drops in, so a rekey takes seconds and no service call. Whether it is worth setting up depends on how many doors you have and how often keys change: on a single storefront it is not, on a building with thirty units it pays for itself the first year.
How we call it
We look at the hardware before we quote. If the lock is sound and only the key is the problem, we rekey it and say so. If the hardware is worn or wrong for the door, we say that too, in a free written estimate, and fit what the door needs. Either way the visit is same-day when the schedule allows, and you leave with keys that only you hold.