Non-destructive entry first, always - and we re-key Schlage, Kwikset, and Baldwin locks on the spot while you watch
You get a price before we start. It does not change when we arrive. No surprises.
Fast, Reliable Rekey Locks Across Piedmont
Rekeying a lock in Piedmont typically costs $95 to $160 per cylinder, and most single-family home jobs are finished in under an hour. That price is written down before our technician touches a single tool, and it’s the same number on your invoice. We’re the team Piedmont homeowners call when they’ve just closed escrow, fired a contractor, or simply lost track of who has a key. For businesses, we also offer our Commercial Locksmith in Piedmont. Call (409) 405-4485 and a live person answers, 24/7 – no voicemail tree, no callback queue.
Piedmont’s housing stock creates a specific kind of rekey job. These are not apartment complex hallways or office suites. They’re pre-war Mediterranean and Tudor revival homes with original mortise locks, alley-facing rear doors, and detached garages that often sit on completely different keyways than the main house. If you live off Crocker Avenue, Wildwood Avenue, or near Piedmont Park, you already know the drill: your front door hardware is probably older than your grandparents, and your back door swings onto a shared alley. We know these homes because we work on them every week.
Why Preston Locksmith & Security Is Piedmont’s Preferred Rekey Locks Company
Kevin Yoon and his team have been rekeying Piedmont homes since Preston Locksmith & Security opened its doors in 2008. We’re part of the Relay Home Co. family, and this location is independently owned and operated – which means the crew showing up at your door works under the name you called, not a dispatch service that sold your job to the lowest bidder.
Every Piedmont job runs under The Relay Visibility Guarantee: a written price before work begins, a live arrival time you can track from your phone, before-and-after photos of the actual lock work, and a written guarantee on every repair. If something isn’t right, our 365-Day Done Right Promise kicks in – a free second visit, no charge, no argument. That’s not a slogan on a website. It’s stamped on every repair we do in Piedmont.
Response time to most Piedmont addresses – from the Grand Avenue corridor up to Hampton Road – runs about 30 to 45 minutes for standard rekey calls. Emergency after-hours jobs take a little longer to route, but you’ll still get a live person on the first ring and a trackable ETA before anyone leaves the shop. You should never sit through a four-hour window with a dead battery in your keypad and no idea who’s coming.
Rekey Door Lock in Piedmont
Rekey Locks means repinning the internal cylinder so the old keys stop working and a new key operates the same hardware. In Piedmont, a rekey door lock job usually starts with a front door that hasn’t been touched in decades – often a Baldwin or Sargent mortise lock set into a solid oak door. We pull the cylinder, swap the pin and tumbler stacks, cut a fresh key, and test the action. No new hardware required. Standard pricing runs $95 to $160 per cylinder depending on the lock type, and that number is in writing before we start.
Escrow and New-Move Rekeys
Piedmont real estate moves fast, and nobody hands you a log of every key ever cut for that 1920s front door. Closing escrow without a rekey means the previous owner’s family, their contractor, their dog walker, and the teenager who house-sat in 2019 all still have working keys. We rekey every exterior cylinder the day you get keys, and we document each one – brand, cylinder type, location – so your insurance and HOA paperwork goes through clean.
Alley Door and Garage Work
Piedmont’s parcel geometry means many rear doors and detached garages open onto a shared alley or access easement. Those doors are often on a separate keyway from the front entry, and they’re the most commonly missed cylinder on a generic quote. We walk the property with you, inventory every keyed opening, and put it all in the written price before the first tool leaves the bag.
Rekey Service in Piedmont
Rekey service in Piedmont covers any keyed opening on your property – front and rear doors, side service doors, detached garages, storage rooms, and gate locks. We identify the keyway, repin the cylinder to a new key, and leave the original hardware in place. That last part matters here: Piedmont homes are full of original mortise bodies and brass face plates that are either impossible to match or expensive to replace. A rekey service keeps that 90-year-old Baldwin intact while killing every old key. Pricing starts at $95 per cylinder and typically runs up to $160 for high-security or mortise work.
Mortise Lock Cylinder Service
Pre-war Piedmont homes frequently have true mortise locks, not modern bored cylinders. These require a different skill set: the cylinder threads out of the lock body, the pin stack gets rekeyed, and the cylinder goes back in without forcing the face plate. A technician who treats a mortise lock like a Kwikset deadbolt can crack the plate or strip the threaded collar, and suddenly you’re shopping for a lock that hasn’t been manufactured in 60 years.
Single-Key Convenience
Many Piedmont homeowners want one key for every exterior door. We can key all cylinders alike – front door, alley door, garage, gate – so you carry one key instead of three. This is especially useful for the rear alley door that currently opens on a different keyway than the house. We’ll do it in the same visit and it’s all part of the written price.
Trusted Brands We Service in Piedmont
We’re trained and equipped to rekey and repair Kwikset, Medeco, Yale, and Baldwin hardware – the brands most common in Piedmont’s mix of original and updated locks. That covers the everyday Kwikset deadbolt on a rear door, the Medeco high-security cylinder on a contractor’s gate lock, the Baldwin mortise set on an original front entry, and Yale keypad hardware. We stock common pins and parts for these brands on the truck, which is why most Piedmont rekey jobs finish in a single visit without a second trip for parts.
Common Rekey Locks Problems We See in Piedmont Homes
- Mortise locks nobody catalogued. Homeowner’s insurance or an HOA wants documentation of the rekey scope, but the original mortise lock brand and cylinder type were never recorded. We note the brand – Baldwin, Sargent, whatever it is – and cylinder type on every job so your paperwork doesn’t get kicked back.
- Weather-swollen mortise pockets on old front doors. Piedmont’s fog and wet winters swell wood frame members. A tech who forces a non-original cylinder into a 90-year-old mortise body can crack the face plate. We rekey the original cylinder instead of cramming in something that doesn’t belong.
- Alley-facing rear doors on separate keyways. The gate and detached garage often open on a completely different key than the house. If the quote says “one door,” you’re surprised later. We inventory every keyed opening up front.
- New owners with no key history. Just closed escrow? Previous owners, their families, their contractors, their realtors – all of them may still have keys. The only way to know a property is secure is to rekey every exterior cylinder and start the key count at zero.
Pricing for Rekey Locks in Piedmont, CA
Rekeying in Piedmont runs $95 to $160 per cylinder. A standard Kwikset or Schlage deadbolt sits at the lower end; a Baldwin mortise cylinder or a Medeco high-security lock lands on the higher end. A typical two-door, two-cylinder job runs $190 to $320 all-in, and you’ll see that exact number in writing before we start. There is no call-out surcharge added on arrival, no “minimum service fee” that appears at the end, and the price we quote is the price on your invoice. Call (409) 405-4485 and we’ll give you an honest range on the phone, then lock it in writing when our tech sees the hardware.
We Also Serve Cities Near Piedmont
Our Piedmont crews regularly handle rekey work in Rekey Locks in Piedmont and neighboring communities: Emeryville, Oakland, Alameda, and Berkeley. Same team, same written pricing, same live tracking – just a few minutes further out depending on where you are.
Serving Piedmont, CA - Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Piedmont area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage - if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs About Rekey Locks in Piedmont
Because The Relay Visibility Guarantee gives you a live trackable arrival time, a uniformed background-checked technician, and the before-and-after photos of every job. You’ll know who’s coming, what they look like, and exactly when they’ll knock – before they knock. That’s standard on every Piedmont job.
Almost always, they can be rekeyed. We pull the cylinder, repin the stack to a new key, and put the original hardware back in place. Replacing a 1930s Baldwin mortise lock is expensive and often impossible to match. Rekeying keeps the hardware and kills the old keys. Call (409) 405-4485 and we’ll tell you what you’re working with before we touch anything.
Under an hour for a standard two-door rekey. The work itself is fast – the pinning takes about 10 to 15 minutes per cylinder. What adds time is the walkthrough: identifying every keyed opening, checking the alley door and gate, and documenting each cylinder for your records. Most Piedmont jobs are done in 45 to 60 minutes.
You don’t need a license to pull your own cylinder and repin it, but mortise locks on pre-war Piedmont doors are genuinely unforgiving. One cracked face plate or stripped collar and you’re replacing a lock that hasn’t been made in decades. For standard Kwikset hardware it’s a reasonable DIY project. For the 1930s Baldwin on your front door, call us – the repair costs more than the rekey would have.
No, rekeying done correctly does not void a manufacturer’s warranty. The lock body, bolt mechanism, and finish are untouched; only the pin stack inside the cylinder changes. We rekey ANSI Grade 1 deadbolts, Medeco cylinders, and bump-resistant hardware regularly in Piedmont without any warranty issue. The key is doing it clean, which is what we’re paid for.
Written by Kevin Yoon, Owner at Preston Locksmith & Security, serving Piedmont since 2008.