LANDLORDS BEWARE!

LANDLORDS BEWARE!

Sometime ago on a routine repair job the tenants of the property told me a story of when they came downstairs in the morning to find a complete stranger drunk and fast asleep on the sofa in their front room. As alarmed as they were initially it turned out that the sleeping man was friend of the previous tenants and he still held a key to the property, being inebriated he decided to crash at his friends place completely unaware that they had moved the week before. All very innocent but it got them to wondering just how many other people had a key to their property!??!  So Landlords what can we do to prevent a recurrence of this kind of incident.

Change the Locks

Of course, the simple solution to this is to have the locks changed on all the doors. This will well and truly stop anyone accidentally or maliciously entering your property. This need not be a very expensive operation. If the door is fitted with nightlatches or multipoint locks, as most are these days, its a simple case of changing out the cylinders. A locksmith would not charge much for this at all. If any landlords would like a quote for such work please contact ACQ locksmiths Ltd at info@locksmithssouthampton.org.uk and we would be happy to offer you a no obligation quote for free.

Restricted Profile Locks

Alternatively, another solution is to have restricted profile locks with registered keys installed. As with the change of locks, in the case of a nightlatch or multipoint lock, it’s just the cost of a replacement cylinder, no need to have the whole lock replaced. The advantage to having registered keys is that you have complete control over all the keys in circulation. Nobody can get extra keys cut without your authorisation or the authorisation of the owner of the suite, so if you issue your new tenants with 4 keys when they leave as long as you get 4 keys back there is no chance of finding someone unexpected on the couch. Initial cost of a registered lock is slightly higher than standard but gives peace of mind and the costs can be covered in the tenant agreement should there be keys missing at the end of tenancy, requiring the locks to be replaced.

Master Suite Of Locks

If you are one of those lucky people who can afford have more than one property to rent, you could have a number of locks on a registered master suite system. In this case the keys are still registered and additional copies cannot be cut by anyone and you would hold an overriding masterkey that would gain you access to all the doors in all the properties. This system does incur more costs but again they are not super expensive and again should you wish me to quote you please visit my website at www.locksmithssouthampton.org.uk or contact me at info@locksmithssouthampton.org.uk. Additionally, I can also supply cylinders with a split clutch, so that even if there is a key on the inside your key will still work from outside.

Stay Safe!

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