Record it first, close it up afterwards
Touch nothing before the police have been. Marks on the leaf, the frame and the lock are part of what they record, and a door already put back in order makes that impossible. This holds even when the break-in plainly happened weeks earlier, which is the usual case on the Moyenne Corniche villas opened only for the season.
Photograph from several angles: the outside face of the door, the area around the lock, the frame, the splinters, the inside of the property. On corniche properties add the gate and the access lane. The point of entry is not always the front door, and your insurer will want to know the route taken before opening the file.
Report it to the police, then declare the loss to your insurer within the period set out in your policy. If you live abroad part of the year, tell whoever holds a set of keys in Villefranche as well: that person becomes your point of contact for the police visit, for letting trades in, and for the repairs once the file is open.
What gets replaced, and why the frame matters
Making the property safe comes before permanent repair. Depending on the damage that means a temporary lock, boarding over a broken glazed leaf, rebuilding a torn-out keep or blocking a door lifted off its hinges. In the old village all of this is carried up by hand from the quay, and the materials are chosen for what will fit through.
The frame deserves the closest look. Many break-ins do not break the lock at all: they lever the timber out around the keep. On the old doors bedded into the stone of the Saint-Michel houses, the anchoring often holds better than the joinery, and it is the jamb that splits. Fitting a new lock onto a split jamb solves half the problem at most.
A lock that has taken a crowbar or an attempt to snap the cylinder no longer offers the resistance it was designed for, even if the key still turns. If keys have gone missing, the cylinders are replaced — including those of the vaulted cellar, the store down on the Darse and the corniche gate when they hung on the same ring. Keep every part removed for the insurer.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our securing your home after a break-in page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Villefranche-sur-Mer.