6 Tips For Great Shingle Roof Replacement in Canton MI

• Twelve Oaks Roofing
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If you’re looking for single roof replacement canton MI, there are some tips you should keep in mind. It’s a good idea to go for exactly what you want when it comes to handing missing shingle MI problems since everyone’s situation is different.

Act Quickly

It’s important to be thorough with your vetting of companies and your preparations for repairing and replacing missing shingles, but it’s also important to make sure that you don’t wait too long. This is for the following reasons:

• Damaged Shingles Lead to a Damaged Roof- Damaged shingles aren’t protecting your roof properly and can even lead to other problems down the line. The more damaged they get, the more damaged your roof can get, making it necessary to possibly just remove the whole thing.
• Missing Shingles Reduce Protection-The fewer shingles you have up on your roof, the less protection you have. Shingles falling away can lead to a cascade effect where you may lose more and more, and at the least, they often lead to an effect where damage to your roof increases exponentially.
• Delays Can Happen- The more you delay fixing shingles, the more you risk some other delay coming along and making it worse. Weather, or problems with scheduling, or the contractor being unavailable due to someone else coming in and getting their attention before you start your project can always slow down getting to completion. The quicker you take care of it the better you’ll be able to protect your roof.

Think About Shingle Characteristics

While replacing or repairing shingles, it’s important to pay attention to what kind of shingles you’re going to be using. Obviously, chances are good that you’ll just want to go with whatever kind of shingles you had before, but if you have enough shingles that you’re considering replacing the whole roof with new ones, then it could come into play more. Asphalt shingles are known for being cheap and durable, for example.

However, there are also other things to consider such as color. There’s a huge range of potential colors in shingles, depending on the brand. You could have colors like Brownwood, silver, estate gray, terra cotta, Shasta White, and many others. After all, if your contractor recommends a full shingle replacement, then it could be an opportunity to improve the coloration if you think that the color you had before didn’t go with the house very well, or if a newly available color could help improve the way that the house looks overall.

Pay Attention to Permits

If you’ve chosen your contractor well enough, they should be able to help out with permits, but you may not want to necessarily just assume that this is the case. Many local areas, including those within Michigan, will want you to get permits before they approve you having contractors work on a roof so that they can ensure it will be done in a manner that is safe for the contractors, the owners, and anyone who may be affected by the situation nearby.

It’s worth checking to see what the cost of the permits is, how long they will take to acquire, and any other complications connected to permits that you may have to worry about well ahead of time. You hardly want that to be one of those things that slow you down. This will add to the total cost of the project, of course, as well as to the total length of time that will be needed before the whole thing will be completed.

Consider Removing the Old Roof First

The same contractors that you get for repairing your roof can almost always help you with replacing your roof as well. That way, they can get you the absolute best shingles possible instead of possibly repairing shingles that are getting more and grungier with age.

At the very least, it often pays to ask the company what their opinion on the matter is in general. Many of them will tell you that if you remove the old roof, it will help protect you from other problems that could occur in the future.

In cases where contractors offer to let you leave the old roof in place when the shingles there have been damaged badly enough, you may want to stay away from this even if it saves you a bit of money in the short term. This is because, in the long-term, you’re going to risk missing potential issues. If you remove the old roof, the contractor will be able to see decking and other potential areas for damage.

Plan for the Day

Another important consideration in terms of tips that will help you get a positive experience is to pay attention to what weather is coming when you plan for when the contractors will come. If there’s a lot of inclement weather on the way, it pays to try and schedule around it if you possibly can. It becomes a lot more dangerous and difficult to work on the roof of a house in order to repair or replace shingles when there is weather getting in the way of that.

In some cases, contractors may not even come on this day anyway, and if this is the case, you’re going to have to wait on their schedule instead of the other way around. This is why it’s helpful to instead try to take matters into your own hands and take a look at the future yourself so that you can schedule the absolute best days possible.

Discounts

Another consideration that’s worth checking on is that if you schedule for shingle repair during a contractor’s off-season, you could end up with a discount. They aren’t going to be doing very much during the slow season, so if you don’t mind scheduling for then, it could give you an advantage.

Even if they don’t offer discounts, it will certainly be easier to schedule them in general, including around inclement weather so that they can give you the best possible speed and value when it comes to the work that they do on your roof.

Vet the Company

You should never just assume that everything will work out with a contractor unless you poke around into their company a bit first. Doing so will be way quicker than you might think. You can often do it in just a few minutes. Here are a few ways you can check up on who you are considering.

• Consider Length and Quality of Warranties-Take a look at the company’s warranties and ask yourself a few questions about it, including how long it lasts for, and what it covers. It’s ideal to be covered for as long as possible, especially when it comes to something as important as a roof. Ideally, it should be covered for 50 years or so.
• Estimate Cost and Convenience-The best shingle contractors will give you an estimate completely for free. This helps to indicate that the contractor is confident enough in their abilities that they don’t have to try to make money on empty promises with estimates that are too high. It also helps if you can access a way to request an estimate right from the Internet since this is the most speedy, efficient, and easy for you to do.
• Customer Service Options-It also helps if a company has a live chat you can access for initial questions, as well as a phone number. This helps show that they are serious professionals and have their customers’ convenience and comfort in mind. That way, you can feel confident in trusting them with your roofing shingles. Obviously, they should also have information about where they are located in Michigan, what kind of services they have, and other information about them.
• Knowledge-Looking around to see what other roofing or other types of services the company offers will also give you a solid sense of how versatile they are. After all, shingles and roofing, in general, don’t live in vacuums. The different parts of your house can affect each other. It also helps to check to see what kind of articles they have up on the site. Not only could you learn something about shingles and roofing that could help you ask specific questions when it’s time to do your project, but it will also tell you a lot about how knowledgeable and competent the contractor is in general. Plus, it could give you a real advantage when you’re comparing one contractor to another. If some of their credentials and reviews of the same, it will often make you feel better to go with the site that has the wealth of information, proving their bona fides as experts.
• The BBB-You are also always going to want a second opinion, specifically from third parties. While testimonials are nice on the site, companies are often going to just give you only the best reviews. You are instead going to want as many as possible, including the bad ones. You can check the Better Business Bureau for one opinion. There should be one local to Michigan. There are grades that go from F to A+ here. This indicates how well the company has done in staying on top of complaints through the BBB as well as a number of other metrics. An A+ is quite a good sign. There are a few official organizations like the BBB that are buy-in by the company so you can often find one that is relevant.
• Other Third-Party Options-You can also try sites like Yelp, Google, TrustPilot, or others to further corroborate the effectiveness of shingle and roofing company. This will get you more information on the situation, but it’s important to understand what you’re seeing. If a review site has fewer than 100 or even fewer than 50 reviews, this doesn’t give you a great read on what people think since it may have been just a few overly angry customers. If they bring up specific issues, that can give you insight, but if they are just yelling at the company because they are mad that the weather was bad, then you can probably safely dismiss a poor rating due to customers who are being unreasonable. This just comes down to paying attention to the specific, nitty-gritty details.
• Licensing and Insuring-One thing that always pays to check out is the licensing of the company you are considering. Many of the best ones will actually post this right on their site so that you can see their official license from the state. It’s also a good idea to see what kind of insurance they have, including Worker’s Compensation. Having as much as $2 million is a good idea, so any injuries will be on the company and not on where they are working.
• Credentials- It also helps to check to see what sorts of credentials, awards, or other accolades a company has before you make your final decision about which one you want to use. There are often seals and icons at the bottom of a company’s page that shows you what they’ve won and how they are certified.

In general, it’s super important to make sure that a contractor is certified with their products they’re using, including specific brands of shingles, for example. Many specific product warranties may only work if they are installed by a company that is certified to use them. Otherwise, this could create problems with actually having the insurance go through. For this reason, it’s always a good idea to confirm these certifications with the brand of shingles that you use, or whatever other roofing parts you want work done on before you get started with a new contractor.

Getting Started

Please don’t hesitate to contact us today. The faster you contact us about your shingle project, the quicker we can get started getting your details and providing you with the experience you want to get your roof and shingles back up to the way that you want them.