Failed Door Lock Mechanism: Quick DIY repair (no pics)

[jabronijames]

So, I have done everything there and when I bang a screwdriver into that hole, it just keeps going in there. It's like I'm driving a nail in or something. The door still won't budge. I am super frustrated right now.

[walangalam]

This is the best thread I have seen for this problem, and since it helped me so much, I though I would complete the thread with my experience.

After destroying the lock mechanism, you should get to this stage:

As the previous poster experienced, when I banged the hole with the screwdriver, it just went through. So I removed the door handle. This is what you should see once you remove the handle:

The latch that holds the door shut is this part.

This part locks the latch. You would need to lift it up so that the latch would move. Here I have a pen lifting it up may 1/4 to 1/2 inch only.

Once you lift this up, the latch would move, just push it in at the start of the red line in the previous pic and the door will open.