Best for: Front-of-home curb appeal and security
The front door does more jobs than any other opening in the house: it’s the first thing a visitor sees, it’s the most-used moving part in the building envelope, and it’s a security element. It’s also, in most homes, the single leakiest opening.
When it’s time to replace an entry door
- You can see daylight around the perimeter with the door closed. That’s a seal that’s given up entirely.
- It sticks, drags, or needs a shoulder — usually a slab that’s absorbed moisture and swollen, or a frame that’s settled.
- The bottom of the slab is soft or discolored — wood doors wick water at the sweep and rot from the bottom up.
- It’s hollow-core or original builder-grade and you can feel the temperature difference standing next to it.
- The lock doesn’t align without lifting or pulling the door.
What’s different about installing an entry door
A door is a window that moves thousands of times a year, and that changes everything about the install.
A window sash cycles a handful of times a season. An entry door in a family home cycles thousands of times annually, and every one of those cycles loads the hinges, the frame, and the threshold. Which means:
The frame has to be plumb in two planes, not one. A door frame that’s plumb across the opening but leaning slightly in or out will swing open or closed on its own, and will contact its weatherstrip unevenly. That’s the draft you feel at the top corner two winters later.
The threshold is a water-management detail, not a piece of trim. It has to be sealed and pitched so water drains out, and the sill pan under it matters as much as it does on a window. Rot at the base of a door frame is nearly always a threshold detail that was rushed.
Strike alignment is a security issue. A deadbolt that doesn’t fully extend into a properly-shimmed strike backed by structure isn’t doing its job, no matter what the lock cost. Long screws into the framing, not just the jamb.
And it has to be right on day one, because unlike a window you’ll notice a bad door install within a week — and it’ll annoy you every day until it’s fixed.
What we install
ProVia entry doors in Signet® (fiberglass, the most realistic wood grain in the line), Legacy™ (steel, strongest security value), and Ascent™ — with matching sidelites and transoms, a wide range of glass, and factory finishes. Fitted and sealed on-site rather than dropped into a rough opening and trimmed over.
