Lock Repair in Columbia, MO

What Missouri weather does to a lock

NOAA's state summary contrasts cold arctic air in winter with warm, humid Gulf of Mexico air in summer. Columbia adds about 16.5 inches of snow in an average season, mostly from December through March.

• Muggy summers. Wood doors and frames take on moisture and swell, so a deadbolt that turns smoothly in January may drag against the strike in July. Adjusting the strike plate is often enough.
• Cold snaps. Metal parts contract and old grease thickens, so keys turn stiffly and latches stop short.
• Thaws. Water that gets into a cylinder while snow melts can turn to ice overnight and keep the key from going in.

Older hardware

Homes built before 1940 are only 3.8 percent of Columbia's housing, but East Campus has houses going back to the 1890s. Locks of that age wear in familiar ways: weak springs, sagging levers, worn latch bolts and loose trim. Repairing an old mortise lock is often more practical than replacing it, since a modern lock may not fit the pocket cut in the door.

Broken locks in rentals

Section 441.234 of the Revised Statutes of Missouri lets a tenant have a repair made and deduct the receipted cost when a condition hurts a home's habitability, sanitation or security and breaks a local housing or building code. The tenant needs six consecutive months of tenancy, all rent paid and no uncured written notice of a lease violation, and the landlord must not have fixed the problem within 14 days of written notice, or as promptly as an emergency requires. The repair must cost less than 300 dollars or half the periodic rent, whichever is greater, and never more than one month's rent. Damage caused by the tenant's household is excluded. Columbia's rental inspection checklist says entrance locks must tightly secure the door. This is general information, not legal advice.

What to send

Describe what the lock does wrong and when: only in humid weather, only in the cold, or all the time. Add a photo of the lock and the door edge. A worn-out lock may call for lock replacement instead.