Door & window repair, statewide
Door Repair
Doors that stick in August, gap in January, or will not close at all
A door that drags, will not latch or has dropped in its frame is almost always a hardware or alignment problem rather than a door problem. We fix the cause instead of shaving the symptom off the edge of the slab.
The slab is the part least likely to be at fault
A hung door is four separate things, and homeowners tend to blame the only one they can see.
There is the slab itself — the door you look at. There is the frame, made up of two side jambs, a head and usually a threshold, fixed into a rough opening with shims. There is the hardware: hinges on one side, a latch and strike on the other. And there is the seal, the weatherstripping and sweep that close the gap when the door is shut.
When a door starts sticking, the slab is rarely the problem. Far more often a hinge screw has lost its grip in the jamb and the slab has dropped a few millimetres, or the opening itself has shifted and the frame is no longer square, or the slab has taken on moisture and grown slightly.
This matters because the common instinct — planing the edge until it clears — treats a temporary condition as a permanent one. Take material off a door that is swollen in August and you have a draughty door with a visible gap by January. The right repair resets the geometry rather than removing wood.
Older Delaware homes often have doors that are not standard sizes at all, having been planed, shimmed and rehung by generations of owners. Those are exactly the doors that should be repaired rather than replaced — a modern prehung unit frequently will not fit the opening.
A door is a system, and one part of it has failed
Before a door slab genuinely wears out, several other things fail first. Hinge screws lose their grip. The frame shifts. The strike drifts out of line. The threshold wears down. The weatherstrip compresses flat and stops sealing.
Every one of those is repairable, usually in an hour or two, and for a small fraction of a new door plus installation.
Delaware adds a complaint we hear constantly: doors that bind through a humid August and then show daylight around the edges in a heated January. That is wood doing exactly what wood does in a humid coastal climate, and the answer is adjustment rather than removal of material.
A door planed down in August is a draughty door in January.
What we repair on a door
The door, the frame around it and the hardware that moves it.
Sticking and binding doors
Diagnosed, adjusted, shimmed and rehung so the door closes cleanly without removing material unnecessarily.
Hinges and sagging slabs
Screws pulled loose from the jamb, worn hinges and doors that have dropped enough to catch on the floor or the strike.
Latch and strike alignment
When a door shifts, the latch stops meeting the strike. Realignment fixes what most people assume is a broken lock.
Weatherstripping and sweeps
Fresh seals and door bottoms, which on an exposed coastal elevation makes an immediate difference to comfort and bills.
Jambs, stops and thresholds
Split jambs repaired, stops refitted and worn or water-damaged thresholds reset so the door seals without dragging.
Closet, bifold and pocket doors
Off-track doors, broken guides and pivots, and panels that jam or will not stay closed.
The problems Delaware doors have
Humidity, damp ground and three centuries of building.
Humidity that swells everything
Delaware summers run hot and genuinely humid, and wooden doors and jambs take on moisture accordingly. The same door binds in August and rattles in January, year after year, which is why adjustment rather than planing is the right approach.
Damp ground and rotting sills
As the lowest-lying state in the country, Delaware has a lot of housing close to grade. Wind-driven rain runs down a door and collects at the threshold, and where it cannot drain it rots the jamb bottom and the sill behind it. Caught early it is a section of wood; caught late it is framing.
Very old housing in the north
New Castle County holds colonial, Federal and Victorian homes whose openings have been settling for two centuries. Frames in these houses are frequently out of square by a visible amount, and realignment is the only sensible fix — a replacement door often will not even fit.
Why homeowners across the state call us
Carpentry and hardware in one visit, from people who only do doors and windows.
We fix the cause
Adjusting a door without addressing what moved just returns the problem next season. We find out why it moved.
Old houses handled properly
Out-of-square openings and non-standard doors are routine for us rather than a reason to quote a replacement.
Rot assessed honestly
We will tell you plainly whether a soft threshold is a section of wood or the start of a structural problem.
Free estimates, firm prices
No charge to look, and the quote does not move once work starts.
Three steps, no runaround
Tell us what it is doing
Sticking at the top, dragging at the bottom, not latching — each points somewhere different.
We diagnose on site
Door, frame, hinges and threshold checked, then a firm price.
We repair it
Most alignment and hardware work is finished the same visit.
We are a mobile service covering all three counties. Pick your city below, or call and we will come to you.
Door Repair Across Delaware
Door repair questions
My door sticks in summer and has a gap in winter.
That is wood responding to Delaware's humidity swing. We adjust hinges and strike and ease the edges rather than planing material away, because a door planed in August leaves a bigger gap in January.
My house is from the 1700s and nothing is square. Can you still help?
Yes, and those are the doors most worth repairing. Openings in old Delaware homes are routinely out of square, and a replacement door frequently will not fit them anyway.
The bottom of my door frame is soft.
Water has been sitting where it should have drained. Rot confined to the jamb bottom or threshold is a straightforward cut-out and rebuild. Once it reaches framing the job is bigger, and it never stops on its own.
Cold air comes in under my front door.
Either the sweep has worn flat or the threshold has dropped. Both are quick, inexpensive repairs with an immediate effect.
How long does a door repair take?
Most hardware and alignment jobs run one to three hours. Rot repair varies with how much wood has to come out, and we will tell you the timeline when we quote.
Other repairs we handle
Doors and windows are all we do, so whatever has failed, it is probably on this list.