The spring went in the cold. We know which one your door takes.
Broken springs, snapped cables, doors off the rail, dead openers, fogged sensors, frozen seals, hail-pocked panels and new insulated doors — across Kansas City, Kansas and the Johnson County suburbs. The price is agreed on the driveway before a wrench comes out, the common parts ride on the truck, and we stay on the Kansas side so the truck actually gets to you.
Price agreed before work · Parts on the truck · Written figures on new doors and openers · Kansas side only
- BANGOne loud crack, then it will not liftTorsion spring. Do not heave it by hand. Replaced the same day, normally as a pair.
- LEANHanging crooked with a cable slackSnapped cable or a roller off the rail. Stop using it before it drops.
- HUMMotor runs, door stays putStripped gear, tired capacitor, or a spring that failed quietly. Usually one visit.
- BACKStarts down, then climbs againPhoto eyes knocked out of line or fogged, or a travel limit. Often a short job.
- STUCKSealed to the slab after a freezeBottom seal frozen down. Forcing it tears the rubber and can bend the panel.
Every job is priced on the driveway before work begins, and most finish in that same visit.
Seventeen jobs on a garage door, and about five of them account for most of our winter
Broken spring repair
Torsion and extension springs sized to the weight of your door, swapped the same day, usually in pairs so the second one does not strand you a month later.
Springs & pricing →
Opener repair & replacement
Stripped gears, dead capacitors, boards killed by a surge, remotes that gave up in the cold — and new belt, chain and wall-mount units with battery backup.
Openers →
Off-track & cable work
A door hanging crooked with a cable off its drum gets stopped, reset, re-cabled and rebalanced before it comes down on a car bonnet.
Off track →
Emergency & same day
Car shut in, door stuck open overnight in January, spring gone before a work shift. Say it is urgent on the phone and you go to the front.
Emergency →New garage doors
Insulated steel, carriage and flush panel doors fitted to the opening you have, with the struts and hardware the door's weight calls for.
New doors →
Insulated doors
Polyurethane-core doors for attached garages that back onto a bedroom or a room above, where an uninsulated panel is the coldest wall in the house.
Insulation →
Weather seals
Bottom gaskets, side and header weatherstripping and thresholds, in compounds that still bend at ten degrees instead of cracking.
Seals →
Panel replacement
One hail-pocked or creased section swapped and colour-matched while the model is still made, and a straight answer when it is not.
Panels →
Safety sensors
Photo eyes realigned, rewired or replaced, including the ones that only misbehave when the lens is cold and wet.
Sensors →Four numbers that explain our January
Garage doors fail on a schedule here, and the schedule is the weather. Cold steel, ice on the slab and storm damage set the pattern for the whole year on the Kansas side of the line.
Two licensing systems meet at the county line, and neither covers garage doors
Kansas licenses nothing here
There is no statewide general contractor licence in Kansas and no garage door licence at all. Any company telling you it is "state licensed" for garage door work is describing something that does not exist. What the state does regulate is unrelated: electrical, mechanical and plumbing masters. So the question worth asking is not about a licence number but about insurance — general liability and workers' compensation — and whether the contractor will show you the certificate before starting.
A business licence in Kansas City
The Unified Government of Wyandotte County requires a business licence, or occupational tax registration, to trade in Kansas City, Kansas. Its Building Inspection trade licensing pages list master licences only for the electrical, mechanical and plumbing trades, which is to say a garage door company is licensed as a business rather than as a trade. The License Department is on 913-573-8780 and Planning is on 913-573-8620 if you want to check someone before you book them.
Class A, B and C across the county line
Overland Park, Olathe, Lenexa, Shawnee, Prairie Village, Leawood, Merriam, Mission and De Soto share the Johnson County Contractor Licensing programme, which grades contractors Class A for general work, B for building and C for residential, plus trade classes, and requires an ICC exam and insurance. There is no garage-door-specific class in it. The office is at 111 S Cherry Street in Olathe and takes questions at contractor.licensing@jocogov.org.
Four calls that fill the diary every winter
Springs letting go
A 10,000-cycle spring on a door used five times a day has about six years in it. It nearly always goes on a cold morning, with a crack you hear from inside the house.
Springs →Doors frozen to the slab
Meltwater runs under the gasket, refreezes overnight and glues the door down. The opener then tries to lift a door that will not move, which is how seals tear and panels bow.
Seals →Pocked and creased panels
Johnson County alone took $91 million in storm claims in 2025. Hail dents the thin upper sections first, and an insurer usually wants to see the door before anyone touches it.
Panels →Photo eyes that will not see
A warm car in a cold garage puts moisture on everything. The lenses fog, the beam drops out, and the door goes back up every time you try to close it.
Sensors →
Two metros share a name. The doors on each side are not the same age.
Kansas City, Kansas is an old city: 157,805 people, nearly 61 percent of them owning their homes, and a median build year of 1961. That means Strawberry Hill and Argentine streets of narrow single-car openings, detached garages off the alley, and doors that have had a panel swapped, a track straightened and three sets of rollers since they went up. Parts for a door that old are a judgement call, and we would rather tell you honestly that a section is no longer made than sell you a repair that buys six months.
Twenty minutes south the picture flips. Overland Park's median house went up in 1989, Olathe's in 1994, Lenexa's in 1992, Leawood's in 1989 with ninety-one percent owner-occupied and a homeowners' association on most streets. Those are wide double openings, heavier insulated doors, openers with the Wi-Fi boards that cost real money when a surge takes them, and architectural committees that care what colour the replacement is. Leavenworth and Lansing add a third flavour again: 1969 and 1986 median builds, Fort Leavenworth families moving in and out on orders, and a lot of doors that need to work properly on handover day.
We cover all three kinds and nothing on the Missouri side. One state line, one set of licensing offices, and a truck that is not stuck on a river bridge when you need it.
Where we work →Four steps, and you know the price at step three
Ring or send the form
Tell us what you heard, what the door is doing now, whether a car is shut inside, and which town you are in. Somebody picks up at any hour.
A technician comes out
Same day when the door will not open or close, otherwise usually the next. They check springs, cables, drums, rollers, rail, opener force and travel, and the photo eyes, then balance the door by hand.
You hear the price first
Parts named with their cycle rating, labour stated, total written down. New doors and openers get a written figure that holds for 30 days. Nothing starts until you agree to it.
Fixed, balanced, tested
Most repairs finish in the same visit from stock on the truck. Every door leaves lifting evenly by hand and reversing properly on the safety test before the technician drives away.
Wyandotte, Johnson and Leavenworth counties
Kansas City, Kansas every day — Strawberry Hill, Rosedale, Argentine, Armourdale, the streets around Village West — plus Bonner Springs and Edwardsville out along the K-7 and I-70 corridor.
South into Johnson County for Overland Park, Olathe, Lenexa, Shawnee, Merriam, Prairie Village and Leawood, where the houses are newer, the doors are heavier and the association usually has a view on the colour. North-west to Lansing and Leavenworth, where a lot of the work is older homes and Fort Leavenworth families on a moving deadline.
The full service area →
The questions that come up on the phone
What does garage door repair cost around Kansas City, Kansas?
Rough 2026 figures for the Kansas side, so you know what you are walking into: a diagnostic visit runs $69 to $119 and comes off the bill if we do the work; a single torsion spring is $215 to $340; a matched pair $310 to $495; lift cables $140 to $270; a door put back on its rail $165 to $380; an opener repair $140 to $320; a new belt-drive opener fitted with battery backup $560 to $940; and an insulated 16-by-7 steel door $1,850 to $3,100 installed. Your figure is agreed in the driveway before anything is touched. The cost page breaks each one down.
There was a loud bang and now the door will not lift. What broke?
A torsion spring, nearly always, and cold weather is what finishes them off. The spring is the coiled bar above the opening and it carries almost all of the door's weight; the opener only nudges it along. Springs are rated in cycles, usually 10,000, which on a door opened four or five times a day is about six years — and steel contracts when it is 20 degrees out, so January is when the tired ones let go. Do not try to heave the door up by hand and do not pull the red release cord while it is part-way open. Call and we replace it, normally both springs together so you are not back here in March.
Do I need a permit to put a new garage door in?
For a straight swap into the same opening, no permit requirement is published by the Unified Government in Kansas City or by the Johnson County cities, and springs, cables, rollers, openers, sensors and seals are repairs either way. What does need a permit is changing the opening itself — widening it, moving a header, altering the framing. That is building work. Whoever quotes your door should ring the city and confirm before the order goes in; Unified Government Planning is 913-573-8620 and Overland Park Permit Services is 913-895-6220.
Are you licensed?
Kansas does not license the garage door trade anywhere in the state, so nobody here holds a Kansas garage door licence and you should be wary of anyone who says otherwise. Licensing is local instead. To trade in Kansas City, Kansas a company needs a business licence from the Unified Government of Wyandotte County, whose License Department is on 913-573-8780. Across the county line, Overland Park, Olathe, Lenexa, Shawnee, Prairie Village, Leawood and Merriam all run through Johnson County Contractor Licensing, which grades contractors Class A, B or C and requires an exam and insurance. We book the work; ask the contractor who arrives for their registration and their certificate of insurance, and do not accept a shrug.
Why do so many springs break in winter here?
Because of what the metal does in the cold. Normal January lows in the metro sit around 20 degrees, the airport averages a little over 18 inches of snow across a year, and the record is 23 below. Steel loses a bit of flex as it drops, old grease stiffens into something closer to glue, and a spring that was already near the end of its cycle count gives out on the first properly cold morning. The same week brings the other winter calls: seals frozen to the slab, photo eyes fogged with condensation, and openers straining against a door that has gone heavy.
Which towns do you actually cover?
The Kansas side of the metro. That means Kansas City, Kansas across Wyandotte County, the Johnson County cities — Overland Park, Olathe, Lenexa, Shawnee, Merriam, Prairie Village and Leawood — and north-west to Bonner Springs, Lansing and Leavenworth. We do not cross into Missouri. Keeping to one side of the state line is how the truck gets to you the same day instead of sitting on a bridge.