Pleasanton neighborhood · 24/7
Birdland: compact houses, fenced yards with gates, and enough rentals that keys change hands every season
Smaller single-family houses on tight streets with fenced back yards and a gate down one flank of most lots. A good share of them are rented, so the keys on these blocks move more often than anywhere else in the city. Seventeen minutes.
4.9 / 5· 274 reviews from Pleasanton and the Tri-Valley
~17 min
Avg. arrival
$89
Service call
24/7
Availability
A change of resident is routine here rather than an event, and it is the reason most of these calls come in. A house that has been rented for fifteen years has been keyed for a dozen people: tenants, a property manager, two agents, a painter, whoever fixed the water heater on a weekday when nobody was home. None of that was careless — a key is simply the one thing on a property that never expires by itself. New pins put an end date on the whole set in about an hour, at $34–$52 per cylinder with everything after the first at the low end, and the retired keys come back to you in a bag rather than going into a bin.
Who orders that work is worth settling before anybody drives out, because on these streets it is not always the person standing at the door. A lockout is simple: somebody who lives behind a door gets it opened at $134–$255 once identification with the address is shown. Changing or repinning the cylinder is a different request, and it comes from the owner or from whoever manages the property. One short written message from either sends the van out with approval already in hand. Say on the call which of the two you actually need, so nobody ends up waiting on a porch for a phone call to be returned.
The gate down the side of the lot is the hardware that fails first, because it is the only lock on the property that lives outdoors all year. A post shifts, the latch drops out of line with its keeper, and the padlock that has hung there for a decade seizes with the key still perfect. Half the time the key went missing two tenants ago and the gate has been propped or wired shut ever since. Putting it right is mechanical and cheap against what it holds shut: the keeper moves to where the bolt actually lands, and a cylinder or a padlock keyed to something already on your ring goes on at $132–$352 depending on what the leaf needs.
Where a house is rented out or shared, a keypad earns its keep, at $208–$515 fitted, on one condition: the metal keyway underneath it stays live and its key is cut at the van the same day. A code can be deleted the day it stops being needed, and a cut key stays a working key wherever it ends up. Flat cells at six in the morning is a real situation on a door nobody checks between tenants, which is why the metal key exists. If you would rather stay entirely with metal, cut a spare now and keep it somewhere other than inside the house it opens. Seventeen minutes to these streets, ninety days on the labor.
Say whether you own the house or rent it, because that decides who orders a repin — a lockout only needs identification with the address at the step. Count the outside doors and the gate before calling, since the count is what sets a repin. If the gate has been propped or wired shut, say so, because that is a post and a keeper rather than a lock.
Nearby
Over the hill, the same van
FAQ
Asked about Birdland
A tenant moved out and handed back two keys. How many were there?+
Nobody knows, and that is the honest answer on a rented house — which is why the fix is not counting keys but ending them. Every exterior cylinder goes back on fresh pins at $34–$52 each, everything after the first at the low end, and from that morning any key cut earlier is scrap metal. Include the gate and the garage service door in the count, because those two are the ones left off the list and they are also the two most likely to have a key still walking around.
I rent here. Can I have the lock on my door changed?+
The lockout half is simple: a door you live behind is opened at $134–$255 with identification shown at the step. Repinning or swapping that cylinder is a separate request and not one settled on a doormat — it comes from the owner or whoever manages the property, and a short written message from either of them sends the van out with approval in hand. Say on the call which of the two you need so the visit is not wasted waiting on somebody's voicemail.
Is a keypad a good idea on a house we rent out?+
Generally yes, with one rule. The keypad is $208–$515 fitted and it lets you hand out a code and delete it the day the person stops needing it, which is exactly the problem on a house that turns over. The rule is that the metal keyway underneath stays live and its key gets cut at the van the same day, so a flat set of cells is an annoyance rather than a lockout. Keep that key somewhere other than inside the house it opens.
Open 24 hours, 7 days
Name the door, and say how long since anyone used it
Pleasanton, whatever the hour, every day of the year. An entry in the tracts, a seized gate latch on a hill street, a pool gate, a safe left behind by the last owners, a shop door on Main, a car sitting in the Stoneridge lot — that is what decides the work, and the work decides the figure. You get that figure on this call with the $89 drive and the clock already inside it, and it is the figure on the invoice. Ninety days on the labor, in writing. The van is a few doors off Main.