Expert Roofing and Siding

It depends on the size and pitch of the roof, how complicated the roofline is, what material you want, and what we find when the old roof comes off. A simple gable roof in architectural shingle is at the low end. A steep, cut up roof with several valleys and a couple of chimneys, or a standing seam metal roof, is at the high end. We will not guess at a number over the phone. Come at it the other way: the estimate is free, and once we have been up there you get a written price for the whole job.

Yes, and there is no charge and no obligation. We will get up there and actually look rather than eyeballing it from the driveway. If the answer is that your roof has another five years in it and you do not need us yet, we will tell you that.

Yes, all of it. Roofing is the biggest part of what we do, but we also do siding, replacement windows, and entry and patio doors. If you are having the roof done it is often worth talking about the rest of the exterior at the same time, because some of it shares staging and a lot of it shares the same water management details.

A repair makes sense when the roof is generally sound and the problem is in one place, like a failed vent boot, damaged flashing at a chimney, or a section of shingles lifted by wind. A replacement makes sense when the shingles are curling or losing granules across the whole roof, when the deck underneath has soft spots, or when you have already patched two or three leaks and a new one keeps appearing somewhere else. We will tell you which one you are looking at, and show you the photos we are basing that on.

Most houses are one to three days for a shingle roof, start to finish including cleanup. Metal takes longer. What stretches it is a complicated roofline with a lot of valleys and dormers, decking that has to be replaced once we open it up, and the weather, because we will not leave a roof open or lay shingles in conditions that will not let them seal properly.

Get it looked at sooner rather than later, even if nothing looks wrong from the ground. Wind creases shingles and they lie back down looking fine, and ice does its damage under the shingles at the eave, so real damage very often does not show from your driveway. The reason to move quickly is that most insurance policies have a deadline for reporting storm damage, and it is shorter than most people expect. We will come look and give you photos whether there is anything there or not.

We do not do it, and here is why. Going over the top means nobody ever sees the decking, so if there is a soft or rotten spot it stays there under your new roof. It traps heat, which shortens the life of the shingles you just paid for. And it makes the next replacement more expensive, because at that point there are two layers to tear off instead of one. It saves money on the day and costs more over the life of the roof.

We tarp the ground and the plantings under the work area, keep the dumpster and staging where you tell us they will be least in the way, and run a magnet over the lawn and the driveway before we leave, more than once on a tear off. Nails in the driveway are the thing homeowners remember, so it is the thing we are most careful about.

All of New Hampshire. We are based in Sunapee, so the Lake Sunapee area and the Upper Valley are where we are most often: New London, Newport, Claremont, Grantham, Newbury, Lebanon, Hanover, Enfield and Bradford. If you are somewhere else in the state, call and ask, because we do travel for the right job.

Any time. We answer the phone around the clock at (603) 456-9640, including weekends. If water is coming into the house right now, call rather than sending a message, and we will talk you through getting a bucket and a tarp on it before anything else.