Locksmith in National City: cars, homes and businesses
A mile of car dealerships, a working port, and some of the oldest houses in the county. All three make lock work.
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- California Locksmith Licence #7974
- Open 24 hours, 7 days
- Mobile: homes, cars and businesses
¿Necesita un cerrajero? Llámenos al (619) 703-0328. Abierto 24 horas, todos los días.
The Mile of Cars
A car town, and what that means for keys
One mile of National City Boulevard holds 21 new-car dealerships between them representing 17 brands.
Acura, Chevrolet, Chrysler, Dodge, Ford, GMC, Honda, Hyundai, Jeep, Kia, Mazda, Nissan, Ram, Subaru, Toyota and Volkswagen are all sold on that stretch, and a lot of the cars parked on the surrounding streets came off it. That is the practical reason we carry blanks, transponder chips and programming kit for the mainstream Japanese, Korean and American makes rather than a token selection.
The jobs that follow are predictable: a second key that was never cut because the dealer only supplied one, a fob that has died four years in, a transponder that needs reprogramming after a battery change, and the all-keys-lost call. We do all of it at the car: you do not need a tow back to the dealer to get a working key.
We will not, of course, cut a key for a vehicle you cannot show is yours. Photo ID, the registration and the VIN, every time. Between the dealerships, the port yards and the old houses we do the lot here: keys originated and programmed, ignitions put right, deadbolts replaced, master systems for a yard or a shopfront, spare keys cut on the spot, and openings when a key is on the wrong side of the glass.
Automotive work we do here
- Car lockouts
- Lost keys
- Car key making, cutting and duplication
- Transponder key programming
- Key fob replacement and programming
- Ignition repair
- Storage-unit and trunk openings
- Spare keys
Old Town and the rest
The second-oldest city in the county
National City was incorporated on 17 September 1887 and it still has the buildings to prove it.
Brick Row on Heritage Square (the Victorian row houses Frank Kimball built in 1887) and the 1882 depot are the visible end of a housing stock that includes a lot of pre-war houses around Old Town, between McKinley Avenue and National City Boulevard. Old doors, old frames, and hardware that has been added to rather than replaced. Those are repair and rekey jobs, and they want somebody who will not simply drill and fit a modern lock because it is faster.
Around the parks (Las Palmas, El Toyon) and along Plaza Boulevard the mix turns to apartments and small multi-unit buildings, where the recurring job is a rekey on tenant turnover and a mailbox or storage lock nobody has a key to any more.
Then there is the working end of the city: the three-mile port frontage on San Diego Bay that forms part of Naval Base San Diego, and the South Port Business Center industrial park. Yards, roll-up doors, padlocks, cabinets and master key systems are ordinary work for us. Anything inside a naval installation's fence is controlled by the base, not by us: you will need to arrange access through the command.
Getting here is easy in a way that matters at 3am: the 5 and the 805 both run through the city, the 54 crosses the south end, and the Blue Line trolley follows the boulevard.
Three kinds of call
Cars, homes, and the working city
The van carries the stock for all three.
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Car keys and ignitions
Spare keys, replacement fobs, transponder programming and ignitions that will not turn, done at the car, on the street or in the driveway.
- Car key making, cutting and duplication
- Transponder key programming
- Key fob replacement and programming
- Ignition repair
Older homes near Old Town
Pre-war houses with doors that have shifted and cylinders that have been rekeyed by several generations of owners. We repair the lock where it can be repaired.
- Lock repair
- Lock rekey
- Key extraction / broken key extraction
- Lock change and replacement
Yards, units and shopfronts
The industrial south end and the Plaza Boulevard shopfronts: roll-up doors, padlocks, gates and staff key control after somebody leaves.
- Commercial and business security
- Master keys
- High security locks
- Lock change and replacement
The full list
Everything we do
Residential, commercial and automotive. If it locks, we work on it.
- Car lockouts
- House lockouts
- Lost keys
- Ignition repair
- High security locks
- Key extraction / broken key extraction
- Lock repair
- Lock change and replacement
- Lock rekey
- Master keys
- Key fob replacement and programming
- Transponder key programming
- Car key making, cutting and duplication
- Spare keys
- Storage-unit and trunk openings
- Commercial and business security
Next door
The streets either side of this one
National City sits between the bay, the 5 and the 805, with Chula Vista below and San Diego above. Bonita is a few minutes east up the Sweetwater Valley.
If your address is Lincoln Acres, it is an unincorporated pocket inside the city. Call it in as National City and give us the cross street. Every job on this page is the same job on our emergency locksmith, residential locksmith and full locksmith services pages. This page is only about doing it here. The whole coverage map is on the home page.
FAQ
National City questions
I bought the car on the Mile of Cars and only got one key. Can you cut a second?
Yes, and it is much cheaper to do before you lose the first one than after. We cut and program spare keys and fobs at the car for the mainstream makes sold on that stretch: Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Ford, Chevrolet, Kia, Hyundai, Mazda, Subaru, Volkswagen and the Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram group among them.
Bring the car's registration and your photo ID. Tell us the make, model and year when you ring so we arrive with the right blank and the right programmer.
I have lost every key to the car. Do I need it towed to the dealer?
Usually not. An all-keys-lost job means originating a key to the vehicle rather than copying one, then programming it to the immobiliser. We do that where the car is parked.
Have the VIN, the registration and your photo ID ready. If we genuinely cannot do a particular vehicle at the roadside we will tell you on the phone, not after we arrive.
Can you work on my car if it is parked on a naval base?
Not without base access, which the installation controls and we do not. If the vehicle is inside the fence you will need to arrange it through your command or the base's visitor control process before we can be any use to you.
Everything on the civilian side is a normal callout: the boulevard, Old Town, the parks, Plaza Boulevard and the industrial south end.
My house is one of the older ones near Old Town and the deadbolt sticks.
That is nearly always the door rather than the lock: a frame that has moved, a hinge that has dropped, a bolt that no longer clears the strike plate. Forcing the key is how a small repair becomes a broken-key extraction.
We repair the lock and realign the strike where we can, and we would rather do that than sell you a new lock you did not need.
Do you rekey apartments between tenants?
Yes, and around Plaza Boulevard and the parks it is one of the jobs we do most. A rekey voids every key handed out before that day without replacing the hardware.
For a building with several units we can set it up so a manager's key opens everything while each tenant's key opens only their own door.
Do you do storage units and padlocks in the industrial area?
Yes: storage-unit and trunk openings, padlocks, roll-up door locks and cabinet locks are on our regular list, with the same identification check as any other opening.
Have whatever shows the unit, the yard or the vehicle is yours: a rental agreement, a business licence, an invoice with the address on it.
Talk to us now
A key cut at the kerb beats a tow to the dealer.
Tell us the make, model and year, or the door and the lock, and we will price it before we come out.
(619) 703-0328Open 24 hours, 7 days. California Locksmith Licence #7974.
¿Necesita un cerrajero en San Diego? Llámenos al (619) 703-0328. Abierto 24 horas.