"Gary" > wrote in message ...
> dsi1 wrote:
>>
>> On 6/20/2014 10:51 PM, Julie Bove wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> > Then you have to call a locksmith and have a new lock put in. That's
>> > what we had to do when we bought this house. The former owner didn't
>> > leave us the keys and we didn't know to ask. Husband was able to get
>> > the lock out but they don't sell any locks that we could buy to put in
>> > there. The locksmith says that by law only they can put them in. And
>> > they can only give us two keys. You also have to prove that you are
>> > the
>> > mailbox owner.
>> >
>> > If you lose the chipped car key, it costs something like $90 to get a
>> > new one of those. I don't remember what the mailbox cost. That was
>> > almost 10 years ago.
>>
>> I think it cost us $50 for two replacement keys for our mailbox in the
>> condo. I suspect that the mailman does the lock replacement himself
>> since it's probably a pretty simple operation.
>
> This is a Twilight Zone thread. I have a locked mailbox in the hallway
> of my apartment building. I was given 2 keys when I moved in and was
> given 2 new keys a few years ago when they downgraded the boxes to
> even smaller.
>
> They are small keys and not standard (like car keys or door keys) but
> the local hardware store had the blanks and made me 2 more backup keys
> for $1.00 each.

Might be a state thing but here they can not make new mailbox keys. When I
had an apartment I had only one key. I tried to get another made for the
person who was cat sitting for me. They wouldn't make it. They also
wouldn't make one recently at Home Depot. Said they can not.