We are due to complete on a house next week and the solicitor has recommended that we change the locks. This is my first house so I have no idea is this common practice or being over cautious? I understand the principles behind it but just wondering how many other people have done it. I have never changed the locks on a rental place (and there have been a lot)
Over to you...
I would.... You cannot KNOW how many sets of keys to your house there are in circulation! Not silly money for a little more piece of mind. Maybe it would null any insurance if there was no break in????
I don't think I know *anyone* that's changed the locks on a place they've bought !
I guess it depends on what the previous ownership was...
I just took possess in December, and did not change the locks. I figured that if the former occupants were going break in and steal my stuff with a key, they would pretty much be incriminating themselves.
Of course, I could be wrong. I suppose they could always sell one on eBay. But they'd still be culpable. I hope.
I wonder if locksmiths just move the locks arround, so you'd end up with some other random persons keys?
I wouldn't bother but do so if it worries you. It;s easy to do yourself btw!
thisisnotaspoon - Member
I wonder if locksmiths just move the locks arround, so you'd end up with some other random persons keys?
ever rented a place ? same risk associated !
I just changed the latch on my front door. CBA to do the mortise, and the back doors are plastic jobbies, so no chance without a fair cost.
When I moved out of the house I rented in Lancaster a few years ago I kept hold of a key, I had to due to the move being on a weekend, the estate agents not being open etc and I knew the landlady was completely renovating the property anyway rather than letting someone else move straight in.
I went back once to see if there was any post, felt weird wandering round the stripped out shell of what used to be "my" house.
The next time I went back, it had been renovated and there was clearly someone living there so I knocked on the door, introduced myself and handed him the spare key. Someone less honest than my good self could have had a field day with it though!
I am due to complete on a property in 2 weeks and have been looking at the same thing as you. I plan on changing the locks as it won't cost much for added peice of mind also having a 5 lever dead lock fitted can help reduce your insurance premium. My thought is that it would invalidate my insurance if there is not a lock of that standard fitted and the selling solicitor who showed me the propety didn't know what kind of lock was fitted so it makes sense to cange it.
It will take an hour topps to change both the yale and the mortice lock so hardly any time either.
Solicitor is giving good advice. If you do get burgled with no evidence of forced entry in all likelihood insurance won't pay.
just out of interest how much would it be to change a yale and a mortice(?) lock
Sounds a bit paranoid to me, I have never bothered. Mind you I do have a key to every address I have ever lived at, as a souvenir.
And they do say that if somebody really wants to get in your house, they will.
Yale £14
Mortice lock £22
Plus an hour of my dad's time so i guess that one will come in at a couple of beers.
Will the beers cover him to come down to Brighton? 
From Aberdeen i would guess he'd be thirsty again by the time he hit edinburgh so i think it'd be unlikely. 
Did seem remarkable value
Will try someone more local...
About 10 years ago and ex tenant let them selves in and help themselves to the current tenants stuff, I changed the locks after that...
As above for the yale and mortice, and they really are so simple to do, you'd be daft not to. Euro locks in PVC doors are even easier, I've even seen the cylinders in Poundland from time to time, but I'd go for these so you can have all the doors on one key.
Screwfix euro cylinder keyed alike.
All you do with those is undo one screw, slide the old cylinder out, new one in, screw back in, done. As a landlord I always change locks between tenancies, but yes some locks just move from place to place rather than getting new.
changed the locks AND the doors on our place.
proper scummers that lived there before us.
as said above, locks don;t really mean diddly squat. if they are scally enough to want to rob you, they are going to do it. key or no key. its really not hard to break into a house.
I've done it, and would again.
Just do it your self, there will be heaps of online guides i'm sure YouTube will show you, if there is a lock already there most of the hard work is done for you.
I've owned a fair number of houses, never even considered it.
Although when we moved in here 10 years ago, one of my neighbours locked themselves out - and by pure chance found that our key opened their front door... Luckily theirs didn't work in ours, but I'm sure someone elses did/does.
Moved loads and never changed the locks...didn't even think it was something to consider and we've never been advised to do it.
Wife and I once managed to lock ourselves out of our new house with some veg boiling away on the hob...managed to contact the former owner who had a spare key and let us in just before the pan boiled dry. We were young and daft 
If I was going to change the locks, I'd diy it...just buy a lock with the same dimensions as the existing lock and swap them out
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