Two second beep on handle black buttons

check along the front seat adjustment rails and center console with a flashlight.

generally speaking, if there were a fob in the car with a working battery, you'd get a long beep when trying to lock the doors from the outside.

 

If there is a key in the car, you should not be able to lock it. Also you can try just going in the car and pressing the start button without a key on your body, see if it'll start.

 

that's crazy

 

The keys are usually lost in between the driver's seat and the center console. That edge is where most keys are lost and never found.

 

Other places to look.

1. The glovebox, especially the bottom half. Pull it out and look in the narrow slot area. A fob could drop in there and never be seen again.
2. The pull out drawer on the front of the center console, and then all the other storage areas in the center console which you have not already exmained.
3. The glasses holder above the rear view mirror.
4. Storage areas on the doors.
5. Under the carpet mats, if any are present.
6. Between the vertical and horizontal pads on the seats.
7. Under the front seats.

If all that fails then tear apart the trunk area, all the way down to the spare tire.

If I had to bet, it would be in 3 - it seems like a place somebody might "temporarily" store a spare key and then forget about it.

Worst case, some previous owner had a spare key squirreled away in a wheel well or somehow tucked into the bottom of the car. Back when plain keys were all that was needed to start a car I recall occasionally seeing them dangling from wires under the front or back of a car which was up on a lift. These keys were not visible except from under the car. I always wondered how well those keys would work after being blasted with road dirt for thousands of miles.

Good luck!

 

I wonder if maybe you could isolate it by moving around an EM shield? This situation is not something I have ever seen before, but since the key emits some sort of radio wave, perhaps if you make a large (1M square?) piece of aluminum foil (crimp sheets together) and then run a wire from that to a ground point, you can mask out the key? Like put it over the left half of the dash, then the right, then over the drivers seat, then the passenger's and so forth. If it is between the key and the receiver, but probably pretty close to the key, it might block it. Or then again, it might not since the signal could bounce to the receiver off some other metal parts of the interior. Fairly cheap experiment though, you just need some foil and a wire. Actually I'm not entirely sure the ground wire would be necessary. Like I said, never tried this myself.

Before you make the big shield first make a little one and verify that it will block the signals from the fob you have.

 

Odd that somebody would have left a fob in there. Usually you know more or less where one was dropped, and because they are expensive, spend the time to retrieve it. Where might one have been dropped that could not be retrieved, a location so hard that they just gave up? Down the front window defroster vent would be one candidate. We will all pray that is not the case here!

 

Interesting. If there was a key in the car, in theory, you would not be able to lock the car (except with the manual key).

Further, the car can tell if the key fob is inside or outside the car.

Something very strange going on.

 

You can lock the key fob in the car if you have another fob. It does not need to be only with manual key.

I'd still say it is where jc91006 mentioned, between driver's seat and the center console.

 

Not with SKS, unless the NA model behaves differently. I always have to make sure my wife takes her purse with her so I can lock the car. When it won't lock, I know her key is in the car.

 

I have a North American 2008 that it is possible to do this.

 

I can lock the other key in the car on a Non-SKS, but not on an SKS.

 

maybe the prior owner hid one