2022 National Average Price Survey Questionnaire
Pricing can be a sensitive topic and a balancing act. Charge too little and your bottom line will take a hit. Charge too much and customers will shop around and go elsewhere. You have to factor in travel time, the size and cost of living in your market and your competitors’ prices, all while facing substantial increases in fuel and supplies.
A November 2021 Forbes article, “How Much Does a Locksmith Cost?,” found that emergency locksmith services (home or auto lockouts) average about $160 per incident. The article also estimated the average hourly rate at $75 and the average residential lock-replacement cost at $40–$100 per lock, plus another $15–$40 per lock for labor.
Locksmith Ledger hopes to provide more detailed guidance with our 2022 National Average Price Survey, which addresses common residential, commercial, automotive and safe servicing jobs, along with the traditional key fitting and duplication tasks. We have added more electronic access control categories this year. (Note that our price survey is only an indicator of pricing trends and isn’t a scientific poll.)
Please fill out this online survey to help us accurately determine prices in the marketplace. The survey is anonymous; we don’t ask for your business name or location. There’s a space at the bottom for comments and recommendations of categories to include.
It has been more than five years since we conducted this survey. Our most recent data, from 2017, found an average service call was $74 during business hours and $92 after hours, and the average hourly rate was $64. We would expect to see significant increases for 2022.
Our Locksmith Ledger archives go back nearly 70 years to the 1953 National Average Price Survey. Back then, hourly rates averaged $3.50 per hour, and almost all types of keys cost less than a dollar. In 1953, a locksmith’s job included cutting keys, repairing door closers (average fee $11.50) and installing automotive springs (average cost $3.50). Electronic locks and automotive transponder systems were nowhere on the horizon.
Thank you for taking the time to continue this longstanding Locksmith Ledger tradition for 2022. We will share results later in the year.
