Oakland Park's 1950s and '60s bungalows have often passed through several owners, and we regularly find an original lockset that's never been rekeyed since the house was built, re-keying resets who can get in without replacing the door hardware itself.
Re-keying changes the internal pins of an existing lock so old keys (a previous owner's, a past tenant's, a contractor's) no longer work, while you keep the same visible hardware on the door. It's the more affordable option when the existing lockset on an older Oakland Park bungalow is still mechanically sound, just older than the current owner's relationship to it. We recommend new lock installation instead when the original hardware is worn smooth, the strike plate is stripped, or a homeowner wants to standardize every door in the house to take one key. Coastal humidity in Broward County also takes a toll on lock internals over time, so even a lockset that looks fine on the outside can have pins or springs corroded enough to make rekeying unreliable.
In the newer townhome developments off Oakland Park Boulevard, the hardware is younger but not immune to the same issue: builder-grade locksets installed during construction were often keyed alike across an entire phase of homes, which means neighboring units may share compatible keys until they're individually rekeyed. When we do install new hardware, we work with established manufacturers like Schlage or Kwikset. We also see requests from townhome owners who simply want to upgrade a builder-grade lock to something with a better warranty before the original ever fails.
This service also covers straightforward upgrades: swapping a worn or loose deadbolt, matching new locks to existing keys across a whole house, or rekeying every door on a property to a single key after a move-in, a common request for buyers taking over an older Oakland Park bungalow with an unknown key history. Landlords with rental properties scattered through Oakland Park's older blocks often schedule rekeying as a standard part of tenant turnover, rather than waiting for a specific incident to prompt it.
Given how many Oakland Park bungalows have changed hands since the 1950s and '60s, rekeying an unknown key history is one of the most requested jobs we get in 33334 and 33311.
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Call (954) 282-8660