Strata Lock & Re-key Guide

Reviewed by Richard Uys — NSW Master Security Licence 000 101 663

Why is strata lock management different from residential?

Common property (shared hallways, fire stairs, foyers, lift lobbies, garages) belongs to the strata scheme, not individual lot owners. Everyone needs access, but you also need security — and those two goals pull in opposite directions the moment keys start circulating. Individual lots are the responsibility of the lot owner, but if keys circulate (an old owner retained a key, a visitor made a copy at a kiosk, a tradesperson never returned theirs), it becomes a strata problem, because every one of those keys probably opens the front door of the building too.

A house has perhaps three key holders. A thirty-lot apartment block in Randwick or Bondi Junction has thirty owners, an unknowable number of tenants, cleaners, agents, dog walkers and short-stay guests, plus every contractor who has ever serviced the lifts, the garden or the fire panel. Without a deliberate system, nobody — literally nobody — knows how many keys to the building exist. A proper system fixes that: lot owners hold restricted keys to their own doors only (and can’t duplicate them); the strata committee has master access to all common property; and contractors or service providers get temporary, time-limited access codes rather than metal keys. When a lot sells, the old key becomes invalid rather than becoming a mystery.

Keytech has installed and maintained these systems across the Eastern Suburbs for 22 years, from six-lot Art Deco walk-ups in Coogee to large mixed-use schemes. The rest of this guide is the advice we give committees in person.

What’s a restricted-key system for strata?

Restricted keys are cut on registered blanks that only the authorised issuing locksmith can legally duplicate — the key profile is design-protected, the blanks aren’t sold to kiosks, and every copy is logged against a signature. Compare that with a standard cylinder, where any resident can turn one key into five at a shopping-centre kiosk in ten minutes, and the security case makes itself.

In practice it works like this: the strata committee keeps the master key; each lot owner receives one or two restricted blanks and signs for them. If an owner sells their lot, the old key stops working — you don’t re-issue it. If a key is lost, only the locksmith can cut a replacement, and only after verifying the lot owner’s identity against the register. For common-property doors (fire exits, switchboard rooms, plant rooms, the strata office), the committee issues access only to authorised people, and the register tells you at any moment exactly who holds what. That register is the real product — the metal is just the delivery mechanism.

For commercial strata buildings and apartment schemes across the Eastern Suburbs, restricted systems are standard practice, and increasingly insurers and valuers expect to see one. Call 0411 340 242 with your building’s layout and we’ll quote a fixed price for the restricted blanks and the cylinder upgrade before anything is ordered.

How does a master key system actually work?

A master key system is a hierarchy built into the pinning of each cylinder. At the bottom, each lot owner’s key opens their own door and, typically, the common entry doors — and nothing else. Above that, sub-masters can be created for a caretaker or cleaner that open common areas but no private lots. At the top, the committee’s master opens everything it’s designed to open. One resident key ring shrinks to a single key; one building manager stops carrying a bricklayer’s hod of keys; and access maps onto responsibility instead of onto whoever happened to get a copy.

Designing the hierarchy is the part that rewards experience. Get it wrong and you either give too much access (the gardener’s key opens the switchboard room) or too little (the fire-panel contractor needs three separate keys and rings the building manager at 6am). We design master-key and restricted systems together, sized to your doors and key holders, and document the whole structure so the next committee inherits a system rather than a puzzle.

How do you handle re-keying when an owner sells?

You don’t need to re-key the entire building. Each lot owner’s individual lock is their responsibility — if they’ve shared keys widely or are concerned about access, they can engage a locksmith to re-key their own door, and most buyers should (our cost guide covers what that typically involves). Strata’s responsibility is narrower and sharper: ensure the old owner no longer has access to common property.

Under a restricted system this is administrative — the outgoing owner’s keys are returned and struck off the register, and fresh blanks are issued to the new owner. Without one, it’s harder: if the lot has a door opening onto common property (a ground-floor lot with a door to the shared foyer, say), re-key or change that specific lock before the new owner moves in. Many Eastern Suburbs schemes now bake this into the settlement handover checklist: all keys, fobs and remotes returned and counted, register updated, discrepancies re-keyed at the outgoing owner’s notice. Document it with the outgoing owner so there’s no dispute later. It’s ten minutes of paperwork that prevents the single most common strata security failure we attend — the “previous owner still gets in” call.

What about fire doors and escape routes?

Fire-escape routes (stairs, corridors leading to exits) have specific hardware requirements under the Building Code: doors on the escape path must allow free egress — a single downward handle or push action from the inside, no key required to get out — while still controlling entry from the outside. Many standard residential locks are too restrictive for fire egress, and fitting the wrong cylinder or latch to a fire stair door is one of the most common compliance faults we see in older Eastern Suburbs blocks in Bondi, Randwick and Maroubra.

Two honest boundaries here. First, the door leaf, frame and closer themselves are certified fire equipment: inspecting, tagging and repairing fire doors is the territory of an accredited fire-safety contractor, and it feeds your building’s Annual Fire Safety Statement — that is not locksmith work, and we don’t pretend otherwise. Second, what is our work is the locking hardware: supplying and fitting egress-compliant locksets and cylinders that let people out freely while keeping unauthorised people out. When we audit a building’s locks we’ll flag anything on an escape route that looks non-compliant and tell you plainly which trade needs to see it. If your fire contractor says the hardware must change, we’re the ones who change it.

Should common-property locks be changed every year?

Not routinely. Re-keying on a fixed annual calendar is mostly a way to spend the admin fund. Re-key when events demand it:

• A key to common property is lost or unaccounted for;
• A contractor or visitor had access and you’re concerned about retained keys;
• You suspect picking, tampering or unexplained entries;
• A key holder — caretaker, building manager, cleaner — leaves employment on less than perfect terms;
• The key register no longer matches reality and nobody can say why.

For lot-owner changes (sales), you only need to invalidate the old owner’s restricted key — no full building re-key. The goal is security without excessive cost. As routine maintenance, most Eastern Suburbs strata schemes re-key common property every 3–5 years, timed to coincide with cylinder wear (coastal salt air is unkind to brass internals), plus as-needed when incidents occur. If your building is within sight of the ocean, budget toward the shorter end — we replace more corroded foyer cylinders in Coogee and Bronte than everywhere else combined.

How do you manage contractor and service-provider access?

Issue temporary access via keypad codes or time-limited digital keys, not permanent key copies. Service providers — electricians, plumbers, pest control, gardeners, NBN technicians — often forget to return keys, or keep them, or leave them in a ute that gets broken into. Every unreturned key is a permanent hole in your building’s security that you can neither see nor close without re-keying.

With a keypad or digital system, you deactivate the contractor’s code the day their job ends, and better systems log every entry with a timestamp — genuinely useful when the committee wants to know whether the cleaner actually came on Tuesday. The upfront cost is higher than a standard lock, but it repays itself in key management alone, before you count the avoided re-keys. For larger schemes this is increasingly standard; for smaller blocks, even a single keypad on the garbage-room and plant-room doors removes most of the contractor-key problem. We install and service keypad and digital locks across the Eastern Suburbs and can retrofit them to most common-property doors, by-laws permitting.

What does strata locksmith work cost?

Committees need numbers for the AGM, so here’s how the pricing works honestly. We don’t publish a strata rate card, because a six-lot walk-up and a ninety-lot tower are different animals — but the shape of the cost is predictable. Re-keying common property is priced per cylinder plus the visit, and batching every door into one visit is dramatically cheaper than piecemeal call-outs. Restricted systems carry a design-and-registration component plus per-cylinder and per-key costs — more up front than standard hardware, far less over a decade once you stop paying for panic re-keys. Keypads and digital locks are quoted per door, model-dependent.

Whatever the scope, the process is the same one we’ve used for 22 years: describe the building — number of doors, current hardware, what’s gone wrong — and we quote a fixed price over the phone before anyone is dispatched. The quote is itemised so it can go straight into committee minutes, the work is invoiced per lock for your records, and everything we fit carries a 12-month workmanship warranty. No hourly meters running in your foyer.

What should a strata lock audit include?

A proper audit gives the committee a document, not a sales pitch. It should: (1) inspect all common-property cylinders and test that they actually work — sticky foyer doors get propped open, and a propped door is no door; (2) identify doors with missing or damaged locks, letterboxes included; (3) assess whether the current system is restricted-key or standard, and recommend an upgrade path if not; (4) check that escape-route hardware allows compliant egress, flagging anything your fire-safety contractor should inspect; (5) reconcile the key register against known key holders and recommend re-keying where the list is fiction; and (6) provide a 3–5 year maintenance plan with indicative budgets the treasurer can actually use.

We offer full strata audits across the Eastern Suburbs and provide a written report to present to the owners corporation. Call 0411 340 242 for a fixed price on the audit, or email the building details to info@keytechlocksmiths.com.au. Many insurance companies value this documentation — an audited, restricted-key building with a current register is a demonstrably lower risk, and some committees have used the report in premium negotiations.

What about letterboxes — the most-broken lock in the building?

Ask any building manager: the humble letterbox bank generates more lock complaints than every other door combined. The cam locks fitted by developers are the cheapest component in the building, they face the weather, and they’re a target — mail theft is the low-effort end of identity crime, and Eastern Suburbs unit blocks see plenty of it. We replace and upgrade post-box locks constantly: high-security letterbox locks resist the screwdriver-twist attack that opens a builder-grade cam lock in two seconds, and keying a replacement to the resident’s existing set is often possible. For committees, doing the whole bank in one visit is far cheaper per box than replacing them one angry email at a time.

Who is responsible for which locks — lot owner or owners corporation?

The recurring committee argument, so here’s the practical rule of thumb used across NSW schemes: locks on common property (foyer, fire stairs, garage, plant rooms, letterbox banks on common walls) are the owners corporation’s to maintain; the lock on a lot’s own front door is generally the lot owner’s, though by-laws and the strata plan can vary this — check yours, and check whether the front door itself is common property (in many schemes it is, while the lock service falls to the owner). Where a door serves both — a ground-floor lot opening onto the foyer — decide in advance and minute it, because deciding during a dispute is miserable. When we work in a building we invoice accordingly and can split billing between the managing agent and individual owners, which dissolves most of these arguments before they start.

Frequently asked questions

Can I issue a key to a lot owner for common-property access?

Yes, but only a restricted key that only the locksmith can duplicate. Never issue a key from a standard cylinder where the lot owner could make unlimited copies at a key-cutting kiosk. Restricted keys ensure you maintain control over access.

What if a previous owner still has a key to the building?

If you suspect a previous owner retained keys to common property, the safest approach is to re-key the common-property doors or change the cylinders. It’s an expense, but it eliminates the risk. Document this with the outgoing owner if possible — it’s reasonable to require all keys be returned as part of the settlement. For strata schemes, include this in your handover checklist.

Do I need approval from all owners to re-key common property?

Check your strata scheme’s by-laws, but most schemes allow the committee to make security decisions without a full vote if it’s a maintenance or emergency matter. Re-keying for access control is typically within the committee’s authority. Document the decision in meeting minutes.

What’s the cost to re-key all common-property doors?

Depends on the building size and the number of common-property doors. A small apartment block has far fewer locks than a large office building with many doors. We quote per-lock and per-job, fixed, before dispatch. Ring us on 0411 340 242 with your building’s layout and lock count and we’ll quote a fixed price.

Can I fit a digital keypad to the common-property entry?

Yes. Digital keypads are excellent for common-property access: lot owners or authorised residents enter a code instead of using a key; you can change codes when owners move; and you get an audit trail of entries. Many Eastern Suburbs strata schemes now use keypads for main foyer or lift-lobby doors. Check your by-laws for approval requirements first, then call for a fixed install price.

How disruptive is installing a restricted or master-key system?

Less than committees fear. Cylinders are swapped door by door, so the building is never unsecured, and residents exchange old keys for new ones against the register over a handover window. A small block is typically done in a day; larger schemes are staged. We schedule around building life — nobody’s locked out of the garbage room on bin night.

What records should the committee keep about keys?

A key register: who holds which keys and fobs, when issued, signature on receipt, and when returned. Under a restricted system the locksmith’s duplication log backs this up automatically. Keep the system design documents with the strata records so future committees and managing agents inherit the full picture — and keep audit reports, which insurers may ask to see.

Managing a building in the Eastern Suburbs? Keytech Locksmiths has looked after strata schemes here for 22 years — restricted and master-key systems, common-property re-keys, keypads, letterbox locks and full lock audits, all with fixed quotes before dispatch and a 12-month workmanship warranty. NSW Master Licence 000 101 663, Security Licence 000209450. Call 0411 340 242 or email info@keytechlocksmiths.com.au from anywhere in our service area — we’re based at 236 Rainbow Street, Coogee NSW 2034, with a 30-minute response target for building emergencies, and our emergency service covers common-property lockouts around the clock.