San Francisco garage door repair, one call away

What usually goes wrong

What usually prompts a call:

• Remote or keypad stopped working
• Door won't open or close
• Loud bang and door won't lift (often a spring)

San Francisco homes, up close

Many houses sit over a ground-floor garage, which is often where the water heater and furnace are. The Mission and Potrero Hill are often sunny and warm when Ocean Beach is foggy.

Summer fog rolls in off the Pacific most mornings in the western neighborhoods. Garages are scarce in older urban neighborhoods, and those that exist are often detached, narrow and built for smaller cars. Hetch Hetchy water travels about 160 miles to the city, almost entirely by gravity.

Winter rain and summer sun are both hard on wood doors and weather stripping. Many Victorian and Edwardian houses west of Van Ness Avenue survived the 1906 earthquake and fire.

Utilities, permits and licensing

In California, licenses for garage door contractors come from the Contractors State License Board, which has an online lookup. Spring and cable work is dangerous because of the tension involved, so leave it to a trained tech rather than trying it yourself.

Water comes from the SFPUC, most of it from the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite National Park. Much of the housing is more than 80 years old. Wastewater from homes here goes to the SFPUC, which runs a combined system that carries both stormwater and sewage, and permits run through the San Francisco Department of Building Inspection. San Francisco is the only consolidated city and county in California.

How we connect you

1. Let us know the address area and the symptom.
2. A garage door company with openings near San Francisco gets the details.
3. The pro reaches out to set a time and explain pricing.

Before the visit

Note the brand of the opener and the door size if you know it.

Note whether the problem is constant or comes and goes.