He tells you the storm door is fine. It closes, the latch catches most of the time, and if you lean on it a little, it swings back into place. You can hear the stubbornness in that sentence, and you can also hear what he will not say out loud, which is that the door has been doing this for a while and he has been doing the leaning. Before you decide who fixes it, look at what is actually wrong. A storm door is really three or four separate jobs in one frame, and each job belongs to a different person.
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Tonight, just look
Stand outside with him, or ask him to show you. Open the door all the way and let go. Does it slam, drift back slowly, or stop halfway? Close it and push the latch from the outside. Does the bolt drop into the strike plate without a fight? Run your hand down the glass or screen for cracks, and look along the bottom edge for a gap where the wind comes in. Check the hinges. Screws that spin without tightening, or a door that sags so the top corner rubs the frame, are a different problem from a closer that has lost its pull. Write down what you see in plain words, something like: closes too fast, latch misses on the left, glass cracked at the top corner, bottom sweep torn. That list is what you will hand to anyone, including yourself on a Saturday morning.
Which parts are a screwdriver job
Most closers have an adjustment screw, usually on the arm or at the end of the cylinder. Turning it changes how hard the door pulls and how fast it lands. Go slowly, a small turn at a time, and test the door after each one. Loose hinge screws can often be tightened with the right driver, as long as the holes still grip. A bottom sweep or door sweep strip can be trimmed with a utility knife and held with screws or adhesive, and it is one of the cheapest ways to stop the drafts that make a house feel cold in winter. The glass or screen panel is a different category. It has to be measured carefully, sometimes ordered, and a wrong measurement costs a second trip and a second wait.
Where it becomes a hire
Stop and call someone if any of these are true: the closer is up high enough that he needs a ladder to reach it, the door frame feels soft or pulls away from the wall when you push on it, the hinge screws keep stripping their holes, the door is heavy enough that lifting it off the hinges needs two people, or the glass panel is large. Holding a heavy glass panel at the top of a ladder with one arm is how a careful man ends up with a shoulder injury and a cracked storm door. A hired person is not a failure of his independence. It is the right tool for the top of the ladder.
If the answer is hire, you still have choices to make. Ask whether one visit covers the closer, sweep, and hinge work, or whether each piece gets its own trip. Ask who measures the glass and whether the measurements are written down before anything is ordered. Ask what happens if the new panel arrives and does not fit. Ask whether the old glass and parts are hauled away. Then compare two offers by the list of what each includes, not by the bottom line alone. One offer that quietly leaves out the haul-away or the trip charge is not the cheaper one.
Keep the list where he will see it
Whatever you decide, keep the written list on the kitchen table, not in a folder. Next time he says the door is fine, you can point to the line that says closes too fast and ask him which part he wants to try first. That keeps the conversation about the door and not about him. If you are looking for a small-repair person in St. Louis, start with the local help page on this site, and check what it covers against your list before you call anyone.
When to ask the doctor
If he falls from a step stool or ladder, or hurts a shoulder, back, or hip trying to lift or hold the glass, call his doctor the same day. Do not wait to see whether it settles on its own. If he feels dizzy or unsteady while he is up high, stop the job and talk to his doctor before he tries again.
Good-week card
Good week: he tells you what the storm door is doing, and the two of you agree on which part is his to try and which part is a hire.