Pet Door for Westwood homes
Westwood is dense rentals around UCLA plus pre-war apartment buildings and mid-century homes, and the dominant pet door customer is a UCLA grad student or faculty member in a small apartment with a patio slider. The sliding glass insert is the standard format here — drop the panel into the slider track, lock it, no cuts, full security deposit returned on move-out. Labor runs $80 to $160 plus $180 to $480 for the panel. Most installs finish in 20 to 30 minutes once the pro arrives, which is convenient for time-pressed grad-student schedules.
Westwood pre-war buildings have plaster walls and 9-foot ceilings; newer post-1995 buildings have drywall and 8-foot ceilings — neither is relevant to a slider insert install but matters if a faculty homeowner wants a door-mount in a single-family home near UCLA. Most parents and pet owners here are renters, so renter-friendly hardware (slider inserts, no permanent modifications) gets prioritized over door-mounts. The pro working Westwood should confirm with your building manager that a sliding insert is allowed before showing up — some Art Deco-era buildings near UCLA have stricter modification rules.
About pet door
Pet door installation is the process of cutting a properly sized opening into an exterior door, an exterior wall, or a sliding glass slider, mounting a weatherproof flap or electronic gate, sealing the perimeter against drafts and water, and verifying the pet actually walks through it. In Los Angeles the work spans four common formats: a door-mount install where the pro cuts a rectangle into a wood, fiberglass, or metal exterior door using a template and a jigsaw and screws the flap frame through both faces; a wall-mount install where the pro cuts through drywall, framing, sheathing, and stucco or siding to run a tunnel through an exterior wall; a sliding glass insert where the pro adjusts the slider track and drops in a vertical panel with a flap built in (no cutting, fully reversible); and an electronic microchip-activated install where the same physical opening hosts a smart flap that only unlocks for your pet's chip or collar tag. A typical door-mount job takes about two hours, a wall-mount four to six, a glass insert under thirty minutes, and an electronic install adds programming and chip-pairing time on top.
Read the full Pet Door guide →Pricing in Westwood
$140–420 typical range for Westwood jobs.
Door-mount pet door installs run $140 to $280 in labor in Los Angeles for a standard wood, fiberglass, or hollow-core exterior door. The pro brings a template, a jigsaw, a drill, and weatherstripping, cuts the rectangle, mounts the inside and outside frames, screws them through, and seals the perimeter. Steel security doors and metal-clad fire doors run higher because cutting them requires a metal-cutting blade and the cut edges need rust-proofing — budget $200 to $340 for those. The flap unit itself is separate hardware, usually $40 to $180 for a PetSafe or SureFlap consumer model.
Westwood pet door FAQ
Can a UCLA grad-student rental fit a pet door?+
Yes, with a sliding glass insert if your apartment has a patio slider. The panel locks into the existing track without any cuts or wall damage, comes out clean on move-out, full deposit returned. Confirm with your building manager that the format is allowed before booking.
What does the cheapest Westwood install cost?+
Sliding glass insert: $80 to $160 in labor plus $180 to $480 for the panel. Most installs finish in 20 to 30 minutes. The lower-end panels (Ideal Pet Products consumer line) cover most basic slider profiles.
Will my building allow a sliding insert?+
Most modern Westwood buildings allow it because there are no cuts or permanent modifications. Pre-war Art Deco buildings near UCLA sometimes have stricter rules. Confirm with your building manager and lease before ordering hardware.
What about a single-family home near UCLA?+
Faculty-owned single-family homes near UCLA follow standard door-mount scope at $140 to $280 in labor plus $40 to $180 for the flap. Coyote risk is low on the flat Westside floor — basic PetSafe or High Tech Pet hardware is fine.
Every pet door pro verifies their identity
Government ID + selfie liveness check via Persona — required for every listing. Pros may earn additional Insurance Verified and License Verified badges by uploading documents we check. Read our standards →