Hmmm....good question.

i can't say...it's a family secret...

Please remove previous comment. :-{

I live in a condominium, and the secret here is everyone keeps a spare key on a light ledge in the hall. I am lucky enough to have a light right by my door.

I get we have no security because everyone knows about the keys, but I'm the poorest owner in the building. They will come to me last.

Like the others, I won't say where I keep mine, but the location works as I've always been able to get to my spare key when I need it.

A relative across town.

My mom lives 5 min away and has keys to my place, when I get locked out she comes and lets me in

Spare key? Ummmm...

I've always wondered about this. I, like Village, live in a condo but not sure where to keep my key. My bf of 4 years has a key. I don't really have anyone else in town to give one to, but he's not always available in case I were to need it. BUT then I realized that the builders of where I live used an ingenious idea (that helps me NOT lock myself out). The only locks on the door are a deadbolt and a chain...pretty difficult to lock oneself out using a chain on the back of the door. ;-)

I have a keyless combination lock on my backdoor, so need for a key ever. And if that fails (it's battery powered, so it could happen), a relative in town has a spare key.

That's a good question....where DID I put my spare key?!

I agree with acrat. Unless you loose your keys, you cannot lock yourself out of your home with a deadbolt lock, as the key must be used to lock the door from the outside.

If you still have issues, get a combination door lock.

...under the carpet?

I locked myself out this weekend and it was not a happy experience. I lost my house keys rather than leaving them in the house. I ended up making a copy from my LL, but I've been trying to figure out where to keep a key. I'm not comfortable leaving it with any of my neighbors. I'm thinking about keeping a spare set in my car and then as long as I can get into my car I'll be good. I hate the idea of hiding a key someplace outside. It just seem unsafe, though I suppose it depends on your neighborhood

What's up with Ronnivp?

My brother (who lives around the block) has my spare key. Though to be honest, I'm more worried about him losing the spare than I am me losing the main key. ;)

Two of my close friends live right next door to me so they have a spare key. They still need to get me one for their apartment. Both lock themselves out all the time. I've had one or the other at my house waiting for the other to come home at least 4 times in the past 6 weeks.

I'm glad I can be there for them so they don't have to wait outside

We keep one in the mailbox. All I have is a keyed deadbolt on each door but it's entirely possible for one of us to go out without our keys and come home to find the door locked (by someone else). Or if we all go out together and don't all take our keys and at some point we split up. It's different if you live by yourself.

We have a little combo lock box that is tucked up under a chair on the front porch. It does mean I have to remember the combo but it works.

Reminds me to make a spare key to my car though...

I need lots of spares apparently. lol. My parents each have a copy but they live 3 hours away so that's more for their use when they visit. I have a spare I keep in the garage and one in my car. I've been thinking of finding a place to hide one in the backyard. I've nearly locked myself out a few times with my new locks (recently bought the house) but thankfully I had the backdoor unlocked so I just had to walk around the house. I'm bad about unlocking the deadbolt but not the bottom lock unfortunately when I take out the trash.

My dad keeps a spare car key under the gas cap. I keep a spare in the basement storage unit in an ugly jewelry box and buzz my neighbors to let me in the front door.

Funny story -- I was once locked IN my house... This rental had keyed deadbolts inside and out, so you needed a key to open them whether you were coming in or going.

I got home from work, unlocked the door, accidentally left my keys dangling from the door, outside. My roommate, about to leave to go to work, locked the backdoor I had used from the inside with her key, then used that key to lock the front door from the outside when she left. I had no keys inside and therefore no way out. Had to wait for the third roommate to get home to unlock the doors.

I blame that 3rd roommate for letting it happen, since she took the keys that were supposed to live in the insides of the doors to give to her boyfriend, without consulting us or making new spares.

I have a spare key that's hidden outside and everyone uses it...my family, friends, the maid, etc.

My grandmother always left a spare key in an orange tree in the yard so that if a family member stopped by and she wasn't home, they could get a cookie and bathroom break.

My brother lives a few blocks away. Added bonus - their house has a combination lock so I know I can always get into their house to get my keys (home and car)

I locked myself out a few months ago. I ended up borrowing a ladder from the store at the end of the block and climbing in through my 2nd floor balcony.

Now I keep a house key in one of my vehicles, inside a compartment that can be secretly opened without a key.

Ha! I remember pacing outside, waiting for my parents to come home when I'd forgotten mine in the house. Now, we trade spares with family down the street. Unfortunately, this won't help our kids either.

Are inside-keyed deadbolts intended for households with little kids who otherwise might wander? That seems a fire hazard like grated windows unless the key is kept near the door.
I knew a guy who hid his key in his front yard. Some one must have seen him retrieve it. Nothing was taken, but his phone bill contained many calls to Canada. The phone company insisted they were made from his home phone, so he had to pay.

i used to keep mine in my wallet.

since moving to our current place almost 2 years ago, we dont have a spare key. we have 24hr maintenance men that can let us in, if needed.

also we have this really old door lock system that you can push on button on the side of the door (near the lock mechanism) to choose whether you want it to lock itself when you leave, or when you close the door it stays unlocked. LOVE IT (especially for laundry day!)

no spare key, I find a stick and reach my arm into the doggy door and kinda swing it around until I can unlatch the door... makes a heck of a mess on the nicely painted wall but it gets me in the house :)

I've managed for 7 years without ever losing/forgetting a key -- until a few weeks ago. I was sick with a really bad cold, and despite my fever, I just had to run to Rite-Aid for more tissues. On my way home, I realized I didn't have my key in the pocket where I always put it. I had to get into the building, find the super, and sniffle until he climbed up the fire escape and got himself in an open window.

It took a huge ladder, an audience, and some impressive acrobatics, so I feel safe that a burglar won't be repeating the trick. The super's getting a tip and a copy of the spare knob key.

The kicker? After he let me in and left, I discovered that I had had my keys all along, just not in the pocket where I always keep them. That was a hell of a fever!

We keep ours inside the BBQ smoker outside. It's the regular, wood-burning kind, not one of those fancy electronic contraptions so we always have to open it up before using the pit (no risk of burning the key). We take it over to the neighbors when we go out of town on an extended weekend (they pick up mail, etc. and just in case they need access to the house). We do the same for them when they go out of town so it works out nicely.

My husband and I both work relatively close to home, so if one of us got home and had lost keys somehow, the other could make it home quickly to let them in. There's also a swing out front which makes it kind of pleasant to wait.

My middle school aged daughter kept losing keys. Nothing seemed to help, not even being forced to wait outside for four hours in below freezing weather without access to a cell phone or bathroom. I solved the problem by getting a realtor's box and putting it on the front porch. House is safe, kid only has to remember a simple 4 digit code. No more crying, lectures or lost keys.

Keep it hidden in a very simple hiding place on my front porch. All of my friends know where it's at. Probably not a good thing, except my great dane is usually there and I don't think many unknown people would try and come inside with her standing guard.

if i tell you, then it wont be a secret anymore, now would it?

We have a spare key hidden outside, but also recently got a new front door and added keys to all of our car keychains. That said, my husband has still locked himself out a couple of times and climbed in a window. Go figure!

We live in a condo with either a superintendent or security guard on duty at all times. They have a master key for all units. But we also have doors that lock with only deadbolts, so the only way to get locked out would be if one of us left without a key and the other left and locked up. We also have to swipe a magnetic fob to get into or out of the building, so it is extra hard to get locked out -- you can't even LEAVE without your keys!

As a kid, our retired and always home next-door neighbours had a key to the house, so we didn't have to be relied on to remember keys. In the rare event that the neighbours weren't around, we knew how to break in! :)

To all you "it's hidden outside" folks, I hope you realize that every burglar knows to look on the top doorsill, anywhere in the porch light, in the mailbox (seriously!?!), under the doormat, in the potted plant, in the plastic fake rock, in the magnetic key holder attached to anything metal, etc.

They burglarize for a living. If you can think it, they've already found it in several other homes.

An old, elderly neighbour lost her key once, and we caught her attempting to climb in a window and intervened. She had one of those unfortunate "needs a key on both sides" locks, and her spare key was located somewhere inside. My partner climbed in her window only to discover we lived next door to a major hoarder. It took him nearly an hour to find the key in the room she thought it was in... We advised her to leave a spare key with a friend or neighbour after that. Yikes! I don't keep a spare key. Maybe I should...

LSUgrad03-
I have been locked IN my apartment as well! One morning I was headed off to work and for the life of me couldn't get the door open. None of the locks were locked and my husband thought I was crazy (or a wimp) until he tried. Apparently the lock/doorknob was so old that a part inside of it rusted off and fell, leaving the door locked and no way to unlock it.
my asshole landlord blamed us for it and wined that he would have to saw into the wall to get us out. The maintenance man just took pliers and broke the metal and we were free.

i have double sided locks in case someone breaks in by punching out some glass or going through a window they'll have to go back out that way (and not with my tv!). now if they kick the door in that's something else... if i ever have guests in the house i make sure everyone knows how to use the locks in an emergency and i leave keys nearby.

i keep my spare key behind the compost bin. i hope i don't have to use it!

I wonder if a burglar would think of looking in the sprinkler: http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/b7c9/

I grew up in a house with a milkbox by the back door. There was usually a spare key kept there, and I once squeezed far enough through the milkbox to reach and unlock the back door. Very secure.

I put a combination padlock on my stand alone garage, and have a spare key hidden in there.
I've never in my life locked myself out of the house, but it's there just in case!

I'm just really, really good at breaking into my own cars and the places I live! On one memorable occasion, I did have to call a friend who was good at climbing to scale my roof and remove the screen from my window. After doing this a few times, it doesn't seem like much of a big deal to hide a key-- it's not that hard to get past a lock anyway.

So I have one of these tucked, unseen, in a corner near my back door and it contains keys to the front door (which are the same brand locks as the back door, but differently pinned so someone might try them and assume they were for someone else's place?)

http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_SPM2024513401P?sid=IDx20070921x00003a&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=SPM3356558701

I don't have to lock my doors. HaHA!

Agreed, locks aren't that hard to get past, so my home also has a monitored security system connected to every door and window. It attracts unwanted attention with sirens, and reduces the time burglars have before police arrive. Nothing's burglar-proof, but burglars are likely to try one of the many less well secured, more promising nearby homes.

Now I keep a spare key buried somewhere in my yard, but when I lived in an apartment I kept one in a magnetic box attached to my car. Parking on the street I figure no one knows what car goes to what house.

Our neighbors have a spare (and we have theirs), as well as some friends that live about 5 blocks from us. We also keep a key hidden in the neighbor's yard, and they in ours.

We have a combination lock-box near the house that contains a key, but you have to know the code to get into it. Also, our garage door has a code on it.

I just moved into a new building and I need my keys to lock my front door. Even so I made an extra set which I'll keep at my office since the property management company charges $50 if you get locked out and even more on weekends. I also used to keep a spare key in my car, but the likelihood is samll that I'm going to have my car key when I've lost my house keys.

At the office! That way, if I ever lose my keys, I know there's another secure place to go to get my spare.

In a combination lockbox that is screwed to the back (not visible) side of our deck. Cheap and took five minutes to install.

Our back screen door is attached to the frame via 2 black, steel triangle-shaped brackets. The spare sits on the top bracket, secured by with black electrical tape.

Virtually invisible.

No spare key. If something happens I crawl in through the dog door... We have very big dogs. :/

My grandmother lives around the block from me, and since her door is always unlocked, because there is always some one home, I keep one there. i always have various sets stashed around my belongings; car, purse, backpack, gym bag, laptop case. seems like overkill but i'm always forgetting my keys and I can always count on having at least one of these things with me. Grandma's is the failsafe.

A friend of mine is really tight with a few of her neighbours and they've all stashed spare keys in the obvious hiding places of another ones house, so that if someone were trying to break in via spare key the key wouldn't fit the lock of the house it is at.

@Trish1980 I don't think any burglar is going to google key hiding places. If they're breaking into houses using a spare key they obviously aren't a criminal mastermind.

Just like to let everyone know that a deadbolt lock isn't a foolproof anti-stupidity device - a friend of mine once got locked *into* his house!

His mother had left for the day and locked the deadbolt from the outside with her key. when time came for my friend to leave, he realised he'd left his keys at his friend's house and was locked inside his house! He called his friend to open the door for him, but if that hadn't been an option of the keys were elsewhere, there would have been a much bigger problem :)

My spares are at the pub down the street- it's open from 10 am until 4am, and chances are that if I've had the sort of day that involved losing my keys, i'll need a stiff one anyways... and when I was a barista I think we had spare keys for everyone on the block at our cafe!

I keep my spare key in the car. The spare to the car is behind my it's side mirror.

I keep my spare key in the car. The spare to the car is behind it's side mirror.****

@ aprilheartsaaron - We have that same kind of push-button lock on our doors at church (1925), and I have locked myself out more times than I care to count because somebody didn't push it back, or didn't tell me they had already unlocked it! It is a nifty little thing, though.

I don't keep a spare to the house - we have a keypad entry to the garage - but my dad and brother have my (local) spare car keys, and my best friend north of here has one for when I go to visit her, in addition to the one I keep in my wallet. Yes, I have lots of experience being locked out of my car.

We never locked our door so I never had a key to lose but now I live in a flat and need a key to get through the front door and it's a nightmare to remember it. Spare key?!?! Please. Our letting agents only gave us one key between the two of us. Spare key? How novel.

at our old condo we had a storage unit in our basement that was secured with a combination lock. spare key was hidden in there - it was perfect!

As for if I lose my keys, my mom who lives about 15 minutes has a spare set as well as my upstairs neighbor/best friend. What funny though is that in our rowhouse (4 apts total) I have keys to all the apts. Apparently they all agree I'm the most responsible and believe it or not there have been several instances of others locking themselves out of the house and their apt and I've had to get their spare from my apt.

I recently had to break a window to get into my house.

Our front door has a deadbolt lock that is locked with a key on the outside, but it also has a interior lock on the doorknob which we never lock. When we are inside, we just keep the door locked by turning the lever on the deadbolt.

Anyway... my 3 year old granddaughter must have turned the doorknob button to lock while she was visiting. As I was walking her and her parents out to the car, I pulled the door shut behind us and of course it locked. Every single door and window in the whole flippin' house was locked! My husband was out of town, all my relatives live out of town and I don't feel comfortable leaving a key with a neighbor. So I had no choice but to break a window!

The glass repair man who came to replace the window charged me $100. ! I need to figure out where to safely leave a spare!

My parents always used to keep the spare in a magnetic box hidden underneath the AC unit. Not only was it on the opposite side of the house, it was hard to find it even when you knew where it was! I think the "key" to a well-hidden spare is just inconvenience ...

Last fall we had just moved to our new house, and had only been living here a few weeks. I stepped out onto our screened in porch to do something and shut the front doors behind me to keep out the chill (we have two front doors). I didn't know that the inner door locks from the inside, so when I turned around to go back in, the door was locked. And our side door was deadbolted, all the windows were shut and locked, etc. I hadn't gotten around to hiding a spare key anywhere, much less making spares. It was November and freezing out, and I was wearing house slippers and no coat. Worst of all, my one-year-old was locked inside, alone, although he was luckily in his playpen. I had to run to our neighbor's house across the street to use her phone to call my dad, who wasn't close enough to come help, and everyone else was at work, including my husband with his copy of the house key. My neighbor had her husband drop by from work to help me, but he couldn't get me in either.

Finally, I had to call the fire department, and they showed up with lights flashing, followed by our local police. It took them only minutes to get in. Apparently a back room's window hadn't been locked, and one of the cops climbed in through there, stumbling over the boxes we still had everywhere, and let me in. It was so embarrassing to be the newbie on the street and already getting locked out (with a showy rescue, no less). That, in addition to being hauled away in an ambulance only a few weeks earlier due to a severe case of the flu, was enough excitement for me. The baby was okay, so it ended well, I suppose.

Long story short: I have learned to a) not close that inner door all the way if I'm on the porch, b) give a spare key to that neighbor (good friends of ours), and c) keep a spare to the side door hidden somewhere in case it happens again.

Just get a lockbox...Attach it to your hose valve so no one can swipe it. Easy and you don't have to worry about anyone getting to it.

Be careful! I left a key under a flower pot once, but when I came back after work it was gone. I had eye witnesses with me to testify that it was gone for sure and I wasn't just temporarily blind. I left and came back 15 minutes later. The key had returned.

I changed my lock and now the only spares in the world are with my landlord and boyfriend.

My coworker's retired mom locked herself out in their fenced back yard one morning while still in her nightgown. The rest of the family and the neighbors all had gone to work or school. She couldn't escape their back yard. The little kid next door came home from school that afternoon. When he came out to play she got him to bring out his mom, who called her daughter. My coworker left work early to let her mom indoors. Happily, the weather that day had been tolerable, but it seemed a good situation for a hidden spare key.

Leave a spare in your office. It may be a pain to go back to work, but if you're like me (lawyer), the building never closes so you can always get it, but it's still in a safe location.

If you have a downspout to a rain gutter, you could put a magnetic Hide-A-Key just inside within arms reach, or tape one underneath any lawn furniture you might have in a back yard. It is probably best to not hide one in such a place that people can see you retrieve it.

Nobody has my spare keys. They are inside my apartment and I give them out (and get them back) as I need to - say if a friend is looking after the cats for me. I've tried keeping keys with two different friends in the past, but I didn't like that they could come in at any time. (And occasionally, they did, to use the bathroom or drop something off or just check up on why I wasn't answering the phone/door....I relish my privacy, and if I want to be alone, then I want to be alone and not surprised by someone coming thru my door!) Of course, I CAN get the building manager to let me in if I'm hooped, but I haven't had to. I grew up in an apartment complex that had a really cranky, kid-hating landlord. I learned to always know where my keys are. :P

Ours is in an empty coffee can on a shelf in the shed. I'd rather a burglar find that key than smash windows to get in...

My siblings both have keys, but I don't keep one hidden near my place. My old apartment locks don't automatically lock after me, so to forget my keys would be to forget to lock the door as I leave. Never happened, never will.

Live in a condo. My key is on top of my neighbor's door sill and vice versa. take that, burglar!

My door is usually open. My front door has a security lock, which I usually get locked out of but if I wait a couple of minutes a neighbor will be in or out. I have a dog and cats. I don't have anything that anyone would want anyway! Uh ..you dont have my address do you....?

Inside a plastic film canister (remember those??) and then I put the canister inside our bird feeder. Can't even see it, but we know it's there.