Sixteen jobs, all of them in this town, and every range printed

$134–$255. Entries, garage service doors, patio sliders, cellars and the room over the garage, opened with nothing left behind on the door or on what is bolted to it. That figure already holds the $89 drive, and the clock is priced before anyone sets off: $52 after 8pm, $94 after midnight. Which of the nine doors it is moves the number far more than the brand stamped on the lock, so lead with that and the total comes straight back down the line.

$112–$208. An air wedge and a reach tool, whether the car is at a curb, out in the Stoneridge lot, or standing on a driveway behind a closed gate — paint and weather seal come through it untouched. If a community gate stands between the street and the car, say so while we are talking, because somebody has to walk the technician through and that is what eats the clock. With the van alongside, most doors are open in the time it takes to find your parking level.

$148–$276. A shop on Main, an office up a stair, a stockroom, a suite out by Hacienda. Proof that the place is yours comes first, and a lease number, a badge or a manager reachable by phone all count. Most of these land as the lights go off, so the $52 evening rate turns up often and it lives inside the total you agreed to, not beneath it. After midnight the figure carries $94, and the number quoted is the number charged.

$181–$472. Jamb rebuilt back to solid framing, a strike anchored with screws long enough to reach the stud rather than the casing, and a fresh cylinder whose bolt travels its full throw again. One visit, and the door locks before the van pulls away. Hours and materials are itemized separately, since that is the form an adjuster or a property manager reads. Side gates and garage service doors get the same treatment — around here that is usually where the forced entry started.

$34–$52 per cylinder. The lock stays on the door and the pins inside it change, so everything cut before today turns into dead metal while the door looks exactly as it did. This is the job that empties the drawer of unmatched keys: entry, garage service door, side gate, pool gate, cellar and the office over the garage all answering one blank, which on a hill property is six or seven cylinders. The first cylinder carries the drive and the rest are cheaper for it, and a gate cylinder stiff from a year outdoors is cleaned and oiled in the same hour.

$132–$352. Deadbolts, knob sets, levers and gate latches, including the first proper deadbolt on a garage service door that has spent forty years on a knob latch alone. Where a seventies door has sagged, the hanging is corrected and the keeper repositioned before the new lock is even unwrapped; bolt anything shiny to a door that hangs badly and it dies exactly as its predecessor did. A pool gate is called out separately and treated as its own job: it has to swing, latch and lock by itself every single time.

$208–$515. A keypad or app lock installed on a door that has been trued up first, with your codes entered, saved and tested twice at the door. Manufacturers ship the override blade uncut, which makes it useless; ours is cut beside the van and tested in the lock before anyone drives off, because that blade is the one that matters on the night the batteries quit. Separate codes for the cleaner, the gardener and the dog walker are why most people here buy one, and they are set up during the same visit.

$216–$570. A dial that no longer answers, bolt work that has jammed, or the safe left behind by the family who sold you the house. It is opened by hand in the room it stands in; nothing is loaded onto a truck. Closet safes, floor safes and the wall safe behind the office over the garage make up most of this work, and most of them come open with no drilling at all. Afterward you pick the new number, we keep no copy of it, and the sensible place to keep yours is a different room from the safe.

No range on this one, and the reason is arithmetic rather than mystery: the price is built from a door count, and the doors have to be walked before anybody can count them. That walk takes about an hour with a notebook, and the chart drawn from it is the quote — one key over a row of suites at Stoneridge, or a household where the housekeeper's key should open the service door and the side gate and stop there. Chart and figure arrive together, before a single blank is cut.

$324–$836 per door. New exit devices, rebuilds and realignments on rear doors, kitchens and suite exits, so the latch drops into its keeper instead of skating past it. The call usually comes because staff have started chaining, wedging or propping the door, and that is a mechanical problem rather than a discipline problem. The outside cylinder can be brought onto a key you already carry, and the closer is adjusted at the same time so the leaf stops arriving out of square and wrecking the device again.

No published figure, because a reader on a hollow aluminum leaf and a reader on a solid door with a closer are two different jobs at two different prices, and the only way to tell them apart is to stand in front of them. Electric strikes, keypads and card entry for suites and small offices, sized to the door rather than to a catalog. Each door is left with a working cylinder underneath the electronics and a metal key that has actually been cut for it, which is the step most installers skip and the one that matters the Sunday a reader dies. Where a building already runs a system, the roster of who is allowed through stays with the people managing it.

$166–$505 per opening. Aluminum glass doors on Main and out at the business parks fail in four familiar ways: a hook bolt that no longer reaches far enough, a deadlatch rubbed too shallow to hold, a cylinder worn past its pins, or a closer that has twisted the whole door out of true. Straightening and repositioning come before any new part is fitted, otherwise the replacement inherits the fault and dies the same death next year. The other half of this work is tenant turnover downtown: cylinder swapped, old keys dead, before the new lease begins. Shut out during a shift, that is a $148–$276 opening, and the repair can follow in the same hour.

$164–$446. A blade or proximity key cut and coded to the car where it sits, and a second one made before the technician leaves even when every original is gone. Going through a dealer with no key left usually means a flatbed and a day without the car; this does not. The paperwork is checked against the license plate first, the machine comes out second, and the engine is started twice before anything is packed.

$99–$208. Pairing a remote or a proximity fob is done wherever the car happens to be standing, and the fobs already known to it are either left in place as spares or wiped from its memory — worth doing on anything bought secondhand, since the previous owner's remote answers until somebody deletes it. If you sourced a used fob yourself, mention it while we are talking: not every make will adopt one, and you should hear that before a charge, not after. Remotes for a community gate are a different animal and belong to the association.

$194–$487. Two faults live under this heading: the key refuses to go round at all, or it goes round and the dashboard stays dark. Either one is rebuilt or swapped out where the car is parked, driveway or curb. Half of them are caused by a blade worn round at the tip, so on makes that allow it the key is renewed alongside the lock and the car still starts on the key already in your pocket. Nothing about this job calls for a flatbed.

$132–$308. For bikes and scooters the code is read off the lock itself, a blade is cut from it beside the machine, and the transponder is coded in the garage or at the curb where it stands. No trailer, and no three-week wait on a dealer order. Three answers speed it up when you call: what it is, what year, and whether any key at all still turns anything — those matter far more than the badge on the tank.