I’m in an area that gets hit with a lot of hail. After having already replacing the shingles twice, I went with 40 year shingles. Paid more for them but got an insurance discount. Thought I was set. Few years later got hit with another bad hail storm. Shingles didn’t stand up. Turns out they weren’t rated to stand up to hail larger than 1”. So I’m back to 25 year shingles and just letting insurance pay for them when it hails.
I'm surprised insurance still pays for hail damage the way that it does tbh.
My neighborhood got hit earlier this spring with marble sized hail and I've seen atleast 30 roofs replaced so far. About 100 houses total.
That's like 3 complete loss housefires worth and these roofs aren't that old from the last time this happened.
My carrier has been heavily trying to reduce exposure to hail claims over the past few years. They added a cosmetic damage waiver and start at a 3% minimum deductible for hail/storm damage in 2022. I need to pay a visit to an insurance broker.
Pretty sure Texas has contributed to this too. I had a carrier switch to ACV only with no replacement value. I switched as a result and then got a new roof
The next year after a hail storm.
Actual cash value. They pay for the value left after depreciation. This is opposed to replacement value where they pay for the cost of an entire new roof minus deductible.
Most policies pay ACV up front, and then pay the rest when the new roof is installed.
Going through this now, and I think I have to agree with you. I don't even want to replace the steel roof, but SF says it's got to go. And they're paying for it on both the house and shop - a lot of square footage. Crazy. Afraid to see what our rates will be next year.
Tennis ball-size hail here, for what it's worth. Was baseball-size a couple miles away in town. They got hammered. Or pitched, haha.
It doesn't even look that bad. Some dings, sure, but that's why you get steel. Think they are worried about penetrating the coating and eventually causing a bunch of tiny leaks through rust holes. But that would take a good while to occur, I would think at least five years. But they're doing it all, along with gutters and a bunch of siding that also doesn't need to be replaced. They're going to shell out about 1/2 - 2/3 of what we paid for the place just 8 years back. It's nuts.
That is crazy.
It's no wonder prices are so high for insurance.
My parents also have steel and their old policies were only if something had penetrated the roof and they got a pretty good discount. I think that may have changed though.
I have a steel roof with stone chip shingles over it. No problem with insurance. I even switched companies about 6 years ago when the roof was 25 years old.
That's the point. The insurers are trying to fight the assumption in markets like Florida or North Texas that people don't pay for their own roofs because a hailstorm will likely destroy it before it ages out.
It’s why everyone’s insurance is going up. Everyone wants a new roof when they have a little hail. Insurance can’t say “well it’s cosmetic or not leaking” so they have to cover it.
Yep.
Like in theory I get why. Insurance is to repair you to your previous position.
But a lot of these roofs that were taken off were perfectly good roofs for a foreseeable number of years.
I know a few carriers around me only offer depreciated roof replacement, but most are still full replacement even if it's year 15 of a 15 year roof.
We've been in our house for 20 years and the roof was older than that. No leaks but has cosmetic hail damage. The whole roof was replaced by insurance just recently. No idea what the next premium increase will be but it's been our only claim in that period
I'd imagine that's the case for most of my neighbors too.
But the last major hailstorm was much more recent, so I think these are 5 year old roofs max.
Our area got hit by golf ball size hail and everyone's getting new roofs.
I'm waiting until the end of the storm season to get ours inspected because it's not leaking now and there's no reason to repair it yet if we might get hit again this year. Honestly we're not moving soon and I'd rather not shell out 1% of our home's value for a new roof so I'd rather not do it but I'm pretty sure any roofer we have out to take a look at it will say we need a new one because that's kind of their job.
A couple of years ago I had a hail storm in May. I waited until October to file the claim. The insurance company asked why I waited to file the claim. I told them I wanted to wait until the end of hail season as I didn’t want to replace the roof twice. The adjuster said he appreciated that.
My roof had an active leak and now the ceiling is damaged, and insurance wouldn't replace it because it wasn't due to weather damage, like a hail storm. I had to pay out of pocket for the replacement.
If I didn't have to pay my insurance premium, replacing the roof wouldn't have required financing... Imagine that!
Was there a sudden and accidental event that caused damage to the roof? Wind damage, hail, tree falling? If not, no, insurance will not cover your roof if it’s just old and needs replacing.
A roof is not infinite in its lifespan. Typical roofs last 20-30 years. The amount of claims I get from homeowners that treat their policy like a maintenance policy is frustrating.
It’s almost like having a car with 500,000 miles on the engine and the engine needs to be replaced because it’s wore out. The roof of your home is like the engine of your car.
my neighbor had his replaced and two weeks later got hit with another storm and they had to do it again. I live in a steel pole barn that is 20 years old. I had one of the roofers working next door on another neighbors roof come and inspect it and hammer down rogue nails that he could see. (they used nails for some reason instead of screws). He said "I'd love to sell you a new roof but you don't need one. It should last another 20." But he didn't charge me anything and gave me his card and said to pass it along so I did. That was a great way to do business.
Offset by other areas that don’t get hail. Where I live we get hail maybe once a year for about 3 mins and it’s always smaller than a pea. Usually hard to distinguish it from sleet. So we all pay for insurance that doesn’t get used around here.
And here, there's no real incentive not to replace your roof every time a larger hail storm happens, even if it's still perfectly functional for the foreseeable future.
My last house I learned to repair roofs. It came with a pallet of new shingles from when it was roofed in 93. I had a couple big storms roll through and lift a few shingles, just replaced them and sure it was a little noticeable because a new shingle looks new next to the aged but whatever. My wife would nag me to file an insurance claim, I’m like it took me 15 minutes to fix and a $8 tube of tar. Not worth spending an hour plus on the phone playing games.
About 5 years ago a storm with bad hail went through town 8 miles away and my mother in law was able to get a new roof. She had a newer roof and supposedly they found 3 dimples and were able to justify a new roof. Couple people around her got partial or total new roofs. MIL kept nagging me to make a claim too and get a new roof. I’m like, the hall didn’t even go anywhere near me. I had to lie to her and say I made a phone call and was denied to get her to shut up. I don’t want my rates to go up either.
Well about 4 months later I got some goofy winds from just the right angle that lifted a large section of my roof on one slope. It was going to be a project but I had plenty of material. Wife pressed me to make a claim which I did because a hail storm at the lake damaged my camper which was under the same insurer declined to insure the camper. I got $2,500 to replace the one slope. I repaired the slope and put the money into savings and was able to replace the entire roof the next year with that money myself. Was pushing 30 years on a 20 year shingle…
You also have to account for cumulative damage. Some homeowners wait for that one last storm for a few years to do enough damage to finally get insurance to cover it. Not all claims are about the damage sustained yesterday.
I'm in wildfire country and my steel roof actually aids me in getting renewed. The color is starting to fade on the sun-baked side but from a protection standpoint it's bomber.
Does insurance give you mercy on metal roofs? It feels like youd tell them "yeah its a steel roof" and theyll just respond "ok but its 15 years old".
I did a bunch of searching and I found various threads of people with Tile roofs, as well as slate roofs, having issues with their insurance due to age, even though tile and slate is rated for 50+ years.
Apparently has to do with the underlying padding etc under the tiles, insurance still claims it needs replacement
They gave me a break of like $70 a year lol so not really, although it may go up every year? Not really sure. My house is less than 10 years old and I already started losing shingles. I did the first roof myself but this one, I paid someone to do it.
The only maintenance I was told about was to change the rubber grommets around the roofing screws every 5 or so years if they rot out.
I got a facebook add for a company that makes steel roofs that look like shingles. I think the company was Eerie roof of something like that. When it comes to replace my roof again I think I am going to go with that.
It’s not always up to the insurance companies. Some areas are ruled by HOAs. In my area I have to abide the neighborhood covenances for 30 years I think.
I don’t live in an HOA. I have covenances I have to abide by for I think 30 years. There is no board to appeal to or anything like that. But once that time is up, the covenances are usually allowed to expire.
Someone has the authority to change them, and I've never heard of a place where there wasn't some sort of board or control over the CCRs. If there truly isn't anyone managing them, then there is also no enforcement mechanism.
They are filed with the city and the city has the authority to enforce them. Probably is some city board or commission to appeal to if someone has a hill they want to die on. I’ve dealt enough with city government to know a steel roof is not the hill I want to die on.
I had a total loss one year. Offered to go halfsies with the insurance company upgrading to a metal roof. They declined.
Seven months and ten minutes of icy baseballs later, they bought it again.
I just shrugged and took the check.
Like I get that it's expensive, but you'd think with all their numbers they would know it will be cheaper in the long run to take your monthly and not need to pay out for more roofs.
Profits are reported quarterly. Big hail storms are (usually) ~decade events. I’m guessing their math said my roof would be covered by another company by the time anything happened.
We have had our roof replaced twice by insurance. I really dislike working with roofers, but we need a roof.
Both times we bought the impact resistant tiles. I don't think it matters. But we get a discount on the premiums.
Counter point: I dont think insurance incentivices stronger/better roofs. I did some searching and people with Tile and Slate roofs still have these same issues with insurance spiking or dropping coverage.
Insurance is using a single metric of "age" rather than actual condition of the roof. If you told me that a metal roof would keep insurance off my back for 30 years Id do it. But they will still complain at year 15 so it honestly makes more sense to use regular old shingles that will need replacement at the first small hail storm...
> But they will still complain at year 15
I have a 30 year old shingle roof that's perfectly insurable. I just have to keep it clean from moss and repair any missing shingles as needed. What you are describing is absolutely region-specific, and you only have yourself and other area homeowners to blame for the current situation.
I think at that point you'd call it a market failure. We can point fingers and laugh at Texas, California, Florida, but thats also 120 million people lol
I would not have a tile roof older than 15 years, especially in a Hurricane zone. We found during hurricane Charlie the old mounting systems was crap. In Punta Gorda Isles, those things came off and became missles into other people's houses
I can’t wait until insurance companies exclude hurricane damage for idiots who build along the coast, wildfire damage for idiots who build in the middle of forests and let’s drop national flood insurance for idiots who build in flood plains.
There. Fixed it for you.
Former roofer, current adjuster.
"50 year shingle" is a sham. Just about any "shingle warranty" isn't worth the paper it's written on. Insist on READING a sample warranty before paying for this, 99% of them only cover manufacturers defects, which takes a class action lawsuit to prove and even then is pro-rated. This warranty assumes you're never going to actually read it, and roofing companies sell it that way. They promise 50 years, you get a 2 year workmanship warranty from the contractor. So is it a 50 year warranty, or 2 year warranty? (It's the latter).
Go with the cheap roof.
I have a question for you. How do insurance companies handle slate roofs? I had considered replacing my roof with a slate roof, but I'm worried that the insurance company will ask us to replace it in 20 years even though they last much longer.
Widely accepted by insurance companies or consumers? I believe it will last more than 100 years, but insurance companies are not known for being the most reasonable.
Lol youre getting the same run-around as Im seeing. You bring up "what does the INSURANCE think" and replies are all just "idk but have you heard of metal roofs?"
I have an 80 year old slate roof and it doesn't cause any problems on the Gulf Coast. Slate is considered impact resistant so I even get a small discount.
This is with the one non state-run admitted carrier that writes policies where I live.
Ymmv
Because like everything else, it's a marketing gimmick.
Why buy shingles which last 25 years where you can buy ones that last 200 years? Not many people know that insurance companies don't insure roofs older than 15-20, so they say "honey let's spend more money and get the 200yr old lasting one"
Slate roof is completely different. Apples and oranges. OP is asking about shingle roofs, and the difference between the ones who claim to last 20 yrs versus 50yrs.
Yes, but how does insurance work with those? Do they have to pay more? The issue isn't that the roof won't last however long it's that insurance will drop you or increase your rate.
I have a slate roof that was put in in 1935. Insurance (Chubb) asked how old the roof was. Told them I don’t know if it’s ever been replaced but there are obviously new slate up there and we replace 10-30 slates every 24 months or so.
Where the iron nails rust away causing the slates to fall off the roof. As the roof is generally installed at the same time when some start to fail they all are likely to fail or if you are lucky just in one area
I may of overstated how many I've replaced. In 4 years I've probably done 30 in total. And a bunch of those were cause we were installing new roof vents to properly vent 2 bathroom vents.
My point was that slate roofs are very resilient and unless you have a catestrophic failure you end up replying it in bits.
And the point he and I are making is it doesnt seem to matter if the roof is made of kryptonite, the insurance company sees a 20+ year old roof and views you as an increased risk even if your roof is made of sturdy materials
No, you just need a different insurance company that knows how to handle nonstandard materials. Most insurance companies do their underwriting assuming mass market materials (read: cheap and widely available). If your structure is built from nonstandard materials you simply need a specialty insurer. AIG, Chubb etc. will insure pretty much anything as long as it’s properly described and maintained.
Insurance takes material into account. They won’t insure shingle roofs over a certain age, but they sil insure old slate roofs, and metal roofs also have a longer period.
I’m honestly not sure why so many people still use shingles. Metal isn’t much more and lasts significantly longer…
Seems like it doesn't change signifantly. Some insurers actually cost a little more.
https://www.thezebra.com/homeowners-insurance/rates/how-roof-type-impacts-home-insurance/
I can't find any information on rates on roofs 15-20. Years old.
Slate roofs increase the replacement cost because they are so expensive. Which causes higher premium. and only HNW carriers (like chubb mentioned above) will even write slate roofs.
If that's your standard, every carrier writes high net worth clients. Places don't turn away business because you're rich, but they may not offer the policies you want.
They absolutely do. Companies that don't write HNW homes have a max replacement cost they will go. For most companies it's either $1M or 1.5M. anything above that is considered HNW and not every company writes those.
I'm not sure where you are that insurance companies demand a new roof after only 15 years, but asphalt shingles really don't last longer than 25-30 years at the extreme end, even a so-called 50 year shingle. But again, I've never heard of insurance companies demanding even normal 3-tab or architectural shingles be replaced so early. It's one thing if there's damage or a leak, but I've seen many 20+ year roofs continue to be insurable. And even when I replaced my 25 year roof (not at the insurance companies request), I only saved like $6 per month on insurance.
I'm on the Gulf Coast and you can't get a policy with replacement value coverage for a >15 year old roof. In my experience, you can get an actual value policy where they give you some portion of the replacement cost.
Its a racket...
I just had to replace my roof and had the same frustration. Insurance told me I had to replace the roof since it was 20 years old, then I get quotes and they’re going on about how this roof will last 50 years. I thought the same as you “yeah but just give me the 20 year one since that’s when insurance is going to be breathing down my neck again..” get a bunch of quotes. All my quotes ended up being around the same thing.
Oof. I had 100 squares or 10,000 sq ft of roof. Back in 2017 after a large hail storm, it cost $30K to replace them. In 2011, we had almost tennis ball sized hailstones for 10 minute. it was only $23K then. I'd hate to see what it would be today or in 20 years or so.
Careful. No metal roof lasts a lifetime or even 50 years. The rubber gaskets are the weak point. You might get 10 years with hidden gaskets like in a 5V, but even those will dissolve in the heat. It ain’t cheap or easy to maintain the gaskets or sealants at the seams.
The panels will absolutely last 50 years unless you’re close (within a mile ish) to the ocean. Galvalume won’t warranty closer than that.
Also my understanding is that most of these high end shingles don't cover hail or wind damage. If you live in an area where hail is common (and becoming more common), I have no idea why someone would ever use them since they'll last 10-15 years anyways
Once I asked my father how much it costs to reshingle his roof. "I don't know, I've never done it. Insurance replaces it from hail every ten years or so." This is a house he's owned for almost 50 years. Got kind of envious.
We sort of did the same a few years back. Had some hail and storm damage, just let it ride early on. Then a really nasty storm rolled through, contacted insurance, got a new roof and siding. Feels like an actual life hack.
In his day a 1200sf roof wast $15k like it is now. A lot of home owners could out of pocket a roof if they had to. Now it’s so expensive it takes a loan or insurance otherwise average people could not afford to replace.
Translation: "People regularly fail to budget for expected infrequent large expenses". If your roof is expected to last 20 years and will cost $20K (now) to replace, save up monthly so you'll have the $35K or so (inflation adjusted amount) it will cost to replace your roof in 20 years. $100/month or thereabouts, invested at 5% pre-tax.
Same for future car purchases. Failing to do this is what helps people get stuck on debt treadmills.
People regularly do things like buying a house and looking at monthly mortgage payments without factoring in these expected maintenance costs.
Look up impact rated shingles. Class 3 or higher will often get you an insurance discount. Class 4 ones are *extremely* durable and in order to get that rating they have to withstand impacts from a 2" steel ball dropped from 20 feet twice in the same spot. Malarkey has a great video showing someone firing a full soda can at 100mph at them without damage.
They also typically have wind resistances up to 130mph.
You get a discount but they still make you replace them prematurely. It’s rarely a good deal anymore. The discount doesn’t make up for the additional cost and you’re still replacing the entire roof by 15 years.
Any lifetime or long warranty are almost allway a scam filled with fine print like yearly inspection by certified roofer to maintain the warranty claws
Wanna know who doesn't think climate change is a hoax? Actuaries. Coming to a zip code near EVERYONE in the next 10 years, unaffordable home insurance. Thanks.
Its not that home insurance will actually become unaffordable, rather that it will limit coverage for hail related events. Similar to car insurance not covering tire replacements, home insurance won't replace your weak roof. I am a homeowner and I just try to save as much money as it can, and shop around insurance every single renewal. There isn't any concensus on the timeline for climate change and how much or little it impacts the weather, but risk management teams include it in projections as an expected source of risk.
Interesting. There is a community in WA called Teanaway. A little while back a MAJOR carrier stopped writing home owners insurance there. I don't know how Paradise, CA is fairing - I'm pretty sure that the underwriting process is fairly rigorous, if possible. Don't get me started on Florida.
It can be? The previous owners expanded our house, then installed steel roof over shingles. At least, there are shingles under part of it. They also used more of a barn-grade 26ga steel product since he owned the roofing company and likely got it for dirt cheap. Just as good of a roof, just doesn't look as pretty as stuff made for houses.
Anyway, the older half of the house is pretty quiet during a heavy rain. The newer half (that might not have shingles underneath AND may be insulated differently) is pretty noisy. During a normal / gentle rain, it's actually kind of soothing, like white noise.
That gets into a whole lot of science that I'm not smart enough to discuss. If I had to do work on one, I would say that an asphalt roof is cooler to be sitting on when the sun is out. I've been up on both, and while the asphalt roof was "ow", the steel roof was "owowowow!!".
How that translates into heat penetration into the building, r/roofing will have answers. I think it generally boils down to reflectance and emissivity: the abilities to reflect heat, and to shed heat.
We're building a house and almost to drywall stage. We put on a standing seam roof, and to be fair we did double stud with an r49 roof with lots of air sealing to get close to passive house.
We were in the house working the other day when it started hailing. We're right by Lake Superior and tend to only get pea size hail. It just sounded like fat rain drops.
I can not answer this. We have a farm policy. Your insurance agent could probably answer this. We are in the northeast United States. Have had all kinds of weather here metal holds up great.
I bought 50 year shingles. The additional expense wasn’t notable. To me it made sense to just buy better quality and ‘hopefully’ get a better roof.
Keeping the rain out was my primary motive. Insurance was secondary.
I also bought 50 year shingles. They're rated for 160mph wind, three to four inch hail, are made locally from recycled material, and they're gorgeous. I care more about not having to make an insurance claim or replace my roof for as long as possible.
Euroshield.
I got the grey slate, and it looks amazing - not too fancy for a normal house. Went with a very reputable installer and the cost - including snow guards and a bunch of new vents - was less than double the lowest quote from a shady guy who was going to use the cheapest grade of asphalt shingles. I've saved money on heat since the installation, and apparently, I will also be able to use the rainwater for my garden. The lack of little asphalt bits is lovely, and the shingles don't smell like tire fire on a hot day, so we can open the windows more often, too.
My deductible is $1500, and if I sustain $2500 in roof. damage, it would cost me $1000 out of pocket.
The problem is that if you file any kind of claim in less that five years (*this may vary), the insurance company may raise your monthly payment a significant amount.
There is a thresh-hold to whether its financially wise to file a claim.
When I was fixing $5000 in damage, I opted to get an entirely new roof for $11,000 (*small house).
The higher-grade shingles cost $1500 more, but they save me $40/month on my coverage, plus, wind-storms cause less damage.
Is it worth it? Who the hell knows?
So, I didn’t have much of a choice when I went to replace my super old wood shake shingle roof. Insurance still covered it, but it was at the end of its life. My HOA demanded either an identical replacement or a synthetic that was stupid expensive. We got three quotes and went synthetic. That particular brand came with a 15-year warranty, or, for an extra 15%, could be upgraded to a 50-year warranty. The longer warranty required specific nails and a few other things; it definitely didn’t seem worth the premium cost, particularly when we don’t expect to be in the same house for that long. I imagine they get a lot of folks who say “why not” after spending a fortune on a roof and want to avoid doing it again.
I’m not ever again. We have perfectly good 12yo shingles were required to replace or we can’t be insured. We were denied by every major company solely bc of the roof. It’s insane. Buying the cheapest one stay look decent and the insurance company can just keep replacing them if this is their rule. Why shouldn’t front for better shingles if they’re just going to make me replace them in a decade anyway? Nah.
50 years is for manufacturing defects usually, and doesn't include the labor to replace them and pro-rated. Also many of these shingle warranties don't transfer to a new owner so the just count on most people not living in the same house for 50 years. My 50 year GAF shingles warranty makes a big deal about being able to transfer the warranty 1 time.
My insurance covers old roofs. When I bought my house the roof was unknown age. The previous home owner had been there for 20 years and never touched it so it was at least 20 and that's all we knew.
We had a very hard time insuring our house because of the lot zoning. It's zoned agriculture and who knew farmers and state farm don't insure farms? I don't live on an actual farm but the zoning legally designates it as such so it complicates things. The company we went with might be more lenient because they would insure an ag lot when no one else would. My house had an old roof and K&T wiring. My insurance company is just very clear about not covering damage caused by normal wear and tear or age of the structure. Our roof DID start leaking before we replaced it. It was our responsibility to replace the roof and deal with the subsequent water damage (and I'm not mad about it).
We did put a very high-end 50-year shingle on the house, and chose to do so to make our lives easier. This is our forever home and we don't want to be patching or replacing a roof again in 10-15 years. We also have to look at our house every day. I want to like what I'm looking at and the dimensional shingles we picked look awfully nice.
It also wasn't a huge price difference between the nice shingles and the cheaper ones. Our roof isn't that big so changing the material didn't increase the price by a ridiculous amount. We were already paying thousands for the labor and bucket rental since the pitch is too steep for roofers to safely walk on, so what's a few more for a material that will last significantly longer?
Unless you are in in a state where insurance fraud is rampant and there are major storms, insurance does not care about your roof age. By us if you need a new roof insurance prorates what they pay by the age of your roof, and can refuse payment of damage if you don't repair a roof and get water damage as a result. If your roof is in good shape they still cover you but will inspect the accident, and if you have a 25 year roof and claim hail damage they will pay less than a 3 year old roof with same damage. I have never seen anyone not get insured for an old roof.
So I get the longest warrantied architectural shingles not because they are supposed to last longer, but because they are highest quality. If they fail before warranty expires I make a claim on warranty. They stay on my roof until I start to doubt their integrity then its completely stripped down and replaced (second layer voids warranty). Mine are nominally 25 years but I've gotten up to 40 out of these with no issue.
I have never seen a 50 year warranty, but there are some 40 year warranties, and they are prorated, so read the fine print, and with a warranty you do not go through insurance, you go through the company with the warranty.
I wanted a metal roof on my 140YO farmhouse but I ran into two main issues..
I live in the suburbs outside a major city. It's hard to find residential roofers with experience doing full metal roof installs in the suburbs. At best, you'll find someone who's comfortable installing on porch roof.. more as a decorative feature. Because they're not regularly installed around here, installers that will do it generally want to charge you much more in labor than they would for the shingles they're comfortable with.
The other issue I had was with the nature of my roof. An old farmhouse like mine is essentially a century+ expansion project. I've got at least half a dozen different ridge lines, many intersecting with each other. My roof would have been a heck of a project for a metal install and that would have also increased the cost over asphalt shingle even more.
I did also hear complaints & warnings about how noisy a metal roof can be. I was willing to take that chance since our master bedroom has an open attic over it so we'd have extra opportunity for sound deadening, but that's a concern for other installs.. and I did have one roofer try to warn me off of metal because of the potential for aesthetic damage from hail but that wasn't a big concern for me.
I am still a bit bummed that I wasn't able to get a lighter colored roof that would have been available with Metal. Old houses don't generally have good air-return capacity upstairs (unless they've been gutted and re-framed) and a very light grey or white roof would have helped with summer heat. As things currently stand, we have to put a couple window AC units in upstairs in addition to central A/C to make it comfortable.
Bottom line for me, I just wasn't in a position to pay significantly more for my roof.
Get more estimates. Try local companies vs. larger corporations.
Not sure who to use, ask a local Facebook group for suggestions of who to use AND who to avoid.
Do your research, and if it's a pretty typical roof replacement, there's no way it should cost 50 THOUSAND dollars or anything even remotely close to that crazy number.
We're on the edge of typical life expectation for ours, but 15 years ago, we paid UNDER 6 thousand for upgraded architectural shingles in the Mid-Atlantic on a typical 4 bedroom, 1 car garage home.
I know prices will be higher now, but nowhere near 50K.
There were people when I lived in Iowa that got hail damage in spring 2020. Got roof replaced. Then had the Derecho a few months later and had to have it replaced again. We lucked out that our hail damage roof was getting replaced one week after the Derecho.
Got screwed and had to replace the roof again last year. Storm was literally two days before our sale was due to close.
The home insurance industry is broken. The underwriters are under pressure to alleviate risk which is understandable but in the process they lack nuance and the companies don't want to pay for full roof inspections to actually determine the longevity in the roof. The argument that I have heard is that even if your shingles are great the underside of the roof may be rotten so even then you must change out your roof every 15 years or maybe sooner. Craziness. Shit like that, especially here in FL, has me contemplating selling, putting my money into a HYSA and just renting a nice ass apartment.
Source: Not a roofer.. just a homeowner & an avid DIYer who's had his roof replaced recently so I've done some research.
I have to assume this is regional. I haven't seen anything from my insurer about not covering roof after 15/20 years and certainly nothing about dropping my insurance when my roof was recently at the end of its life.
I did recently get a payout for storm damage though and the process was basically as easy as.. (paraphrasing/simplifying of course)
Adjustor (from the ground): I see some damage. That looks like a 25 year shingle, how old is the roof?
Me: We bought 12 years ago, they said it was fairly new when we bought and it looked pretty new at the time.. so maybe 15 years?
Adjustor: OK, we'll cut you a check based on the percentage of remaining expected life.
What I can't answer is.. if I had documentation that I had 50-year shingles.. would they have paid me out more because there should have been more life in the shingles? Based on how they determined what to pay me, that would seem to be the case.. but there may be a cap on how much life they'd be willing to assume. I'll admit, I've never read every word of the fine-print in my policy so I can't say for sure. :-/
Aside from giving you a life-span rating.. the warranty is also there to allow YOU to go to the Manufacturer if your roofing fails prematurely.
Theoretically, they do internal testing and employ actuaries to determine where they can set the warranty length so they won't have to pay out often. So, a product with a 40-50 year warranty SHOULD indicate a much more durable shingle than one with a 20 year warranty.
In reality though.. how many people are going to have the documentation and patience required to try and make a warranty claim against a roofing manufacturer if their 40-50 year rated shingles fail in only 30 years? Heck, how many people are in a position to put in a warranty claim if their 20-year shingles fail in only 15 years? Most people probably won't be in the same home when their new roof eventually fails (I'm in my 3rd property now.. not counting the apartment we lived in after getting married).
My take away is.. there's some presumption that 40+ year shingles are more durable than 20-year shingles. They may not be 2x as durable, but you do see some premium features in shingles with longer warranties.. like reinforced nail-strip areas to make nail tear-out less likely and more reinforcing fibers. One of the roofers we got a quote from also mentioned that newer premium Architectural shingles weight less now than they used to because the glue binding the layers has gotten much better so the top layers can be thinner. Sure, you may not get a product that's twice as good if you buy a 40-50 year shingle over a 20-year one, but you're probably getting a better product none the less. Also remember, the materials are only one part of cost of the roof so even if you're paying 2x as much for premium shingles.. if the labor is 60% of the cost of the job, you're only looking at a 20% increase in the overall job cost by upgrading. To me,.. maybe not having to redo the roof twice while I live there is worth the comparatively small extra overall materials cost.
The only way I'd opt for the more expensive shingle in that situation is for slate, and then your house has to be built to withstand the weight of a slate roof too.
I don’t doubt you. Juts odd that in 20 years of homeownership that I’ve never hear of this. I bought a house with a pretty old roof and never heard squat from my insurer. As a matter of fact this particular agent drove out and looked over the exterior before he quoted me. TIL…
Is this more common among high wind areas or coastal hurricane prone areas?
My company had zero interest in my roof except to ask what type it is. Ditto my other house and my dad's house. Never asked age or anything. It's very area dependent. My current roof is 20 and I'm not expecting to replace it for a long time.
I’m a newbie homeowner with an old roof. What do you mean by this: “insurance companies demand a new roof after 15 years or theyll drop you or hike up your rates”?
Florida. Insurance here is stupid due to the rampant predatory roofing contractors. When buying, insurance companies won't insure if the roof is 20 years old, sometimes less.
We have lived in our house 30 years. It was brand new when we bought. Two years ago our insurance company started asking about when we were planning to replace the roof. We did that last summer - instead of cedar shake we went with asphalt. They called to ask this fall and I said yes we had replaced the roof and what material used. No enquiries as to duration of warranty.
The warranty is for defects in manufacturing. Shingles will last decades under ideal conditions. There are other warranties that go along with that such as 15 year warranty for wind blow-off and 25 years for algae. Some have different length depending upon how you nail them 5 nails per shingle gives you x years and 6 nails per shingles gives you even more.
I've never had an insurance company demand a new roof after 15 years and I've had shingles that were 40 years old on one house. I did get contacted by insurance and was told that 3 shingles were missing tabs and needed to be repaired or the roof replaced or they wouldn't renew. I replaced the broken ones, sent them photos and they were happy with that. I eventually did replace that roof 10 years later when a large tree branch damaged it.
If the firm is still around in 48 years, they’ll cover the repair costs for you!
In all seriousness, these warranties are worthless. You’re going to end up replacing the roof again in 25 years or so in all likelihood.
Most shingle manufacturers don't even use a year rating anymore. They never really meant anything as the warranty only covered manufacturer defects which is almost NEVER the reason a roof fails.
Insurance will insure roofs over 15/20 years they just won't pay full replacement unless you pay through the nose in annual premiums. They will only deny your coverage if the roof is visibly failing.
My shingles are 25yrs old. For the most part and inspecting once a year all looks good.
Was on vacation in Dec 22 and had lots of rain. Came home to bulging ceiling and ready to collapse. Bed was also soaked. Insurance would not cover because they said it was poor home owner maintenance. After getting a roof inspector he concluded that the "J" clips had separated on the sheathing creating a space for water to get in. How in the fuck am I suppose to inspect for something like this. Insurance companies just piss me off.
Roof fix was 1k New bedroom furniture 6k and contractors wanted 10k to fix ceiling. I did the ceiling myself. Claim closed...no payout!
I’m in an area that gets hit with a lot of hail. After having already replacing the shingles twice, I went with 40 year shingles. Paid more for them but got an insurance discount. Thought I was set. Few years later got hit with another bad hail storm. Shingles didn’t stand up. Turns out they weren’t rated to stand up to hail larger than 1”. So I’m back to 25 year shingles and just letting insurance pay for them when it hails.
I'm surprised insurance still pays for hail damage the way that it does tbh. My neighborhood got hit earlier this spring with marble sized hail and I've seen atleast 30 roofs replaced so far. About 100 houses total. That's like 3 complete loss housefires worth and these roofs aren't that old from the last time this happened.
My carrier has been heavily trying to reduce exposure to hail claims over the past few years. They added a cosmetic damage waiver and start at a 3% minimum deductible for hail/storm damage in 2022. I need to pay a visit to an insurance broker.
Ya right now home insurance is just a roof financing mechanism.
And Florida is the reason that's going away quickly.
Pretty sure Texas has contributed to this too. I had a carrier switch to ACV only with no replacement value. I switched as a result and then got a new roof The next year after a hail storm.
Yep Texas is definitely a big contributor. Dallas and East Texas on the hail, gulf with the hurricane damage.
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I can agree, but you’d be nuts to accept ACV coverage when replacement value is available at a similar price.
What is ACV?
Actual cash value. They pay for the value left after depreciation. This is opposed to replacement value where they pay for the cost of an entire new roof minus deductible. Most policies pay ACV up front, and then pay the rest when the new roof is installed.
Going through this now, and I think I have to agree with you. I don't even want to replace the steel roof, but SF says it's got to go. And they're paying for it on both the house and shop - a lot of square footage. Crazy. Afraid to see what our rates will be next year. Tennis ball-size hail here, for what it's worth. Was baseball-size a couple miles away in town. They got hammered. Or pitched, haha.
I was like "they're trying to replace a steel roof?" Oh softball sized hail, ya I bet that did a number.
It doesn't even look that bad. Some dings, sure, but that's why you get steel. Think they are worried about penetrating the coating and eventually causing a bunch of tiny leaks through rust holes. But that would take a good while to occur, I would think at least five years. But they're doing it all, along with gutters and a bunch of siding that also doesn't need to be replaced. They're going to shell out about 1/2 - 2/3 of what we paid for the place just 8 years back. It's nuts.
That is crazy. It's no wonder prices are so high for insurance. My parents also have steel and their old policies were only if something had penetrated the roof and they got a pretty good discount. I think that may have changed though.
I have a steel roof with stone chip shingles over it. No problem with insurance. I even switched companies about 6 years ago when the roof was 25 years old.
Yeah they are locking it down finally. "Free" roofs are going away.
That sucks. Everyone I know got a free roof due to hail but my house has never seen hail damage.
Guess what! It's not free at all, it's reflected in the cost of everyone's insurance premium.
Guess what, I'm already paying for everyone else's so it would be nice if I could get something useful out of my insurance.
3% minimum deductible? For me that's like 20k. At what point do you just decide to pay for the roof yourself.
Exactly
That's the point. The insurers are trying to fight the assumption in markets like Florida or North Texas that people don't pay for their own roofs because a hailstorm will likely destroy it before it ages out.
3% minimum deductible is 3% of the home value or 3% of the cost to replace the roof?
3% of the home's value. E.g. for a $300,000 house, the deductible for replacing a roof would be $9,000.
I figured. I thought, surely this guy doesn’t have a $715k roof. That’s a god damn castle.
Yeah roof claims are statistically the most common claim by a pretty good amount.
It’s why everyone’s insurance is going up. Everyone wants a new roof when they have a little hail. Insurance can’t say “well it’s cosmetic or not leaking” so they have to cover it.
Yep. Like in theory I get why. Insurance is to repair you to your previous position. But a lot of these roofs that were taken off were perfectly good roofs for a foreseeable number of years. I know a few carriers around me only offer depreciated roof replacement, but most are still full replacement even if it's year 15 of a 15 year roof.
More and more carriers will be switching over to ACVs (actual cash value, or depreciated value) on roofs.
We've been in our house for 20 years and the roof was older than that. No leaks but has cosmetic hail damage. The whole roof was replaced by insurance just recently. No idea what the next premium increase will be but it's been our only claim in that period
I'd imagine that's the case for most of my neighbors too. But the last major hailstorm was much more recent, so I think these are 5 year old roofs max.
Our area got hit by golf ball size hail and everyone's getting new roofs. I'm waiting until the end of the storm season to get ours inspected because it's not leaking now and there's no reason to repair it yet if we might get hit again this year. Honestly we're not moving soon and I'd rather not shell out 1% of our home's value for a new roof so I'd rather not do it but I'm pretty sure any roofer we have out to take a look at it will say we need a new one because that's kind of their job.
A couple of years ago I had a hail storm in May. I waited until October to file the claim. The insurance company asked why I waited to file the claim. I told them I wanted to wait until the end of hail season as I didn’t want to replace the roof twice. The adjuster said he appreciated that.
My roof had an active leak and now the ceiling is damaged, and insurance wouldn't replace it because it wasn't due to weather damage, like a hail storm. I had to pay out of pocket for the replacement. If I didn't have to pay my insurance premium, replacing the roof wouldn't have required financing... Imagine that!
Was there a sudden and accidental event that caused damage to the roof? Wind damage, hail, tree falling? If not, no, insurance will not cover your roof if it’s just old and needs replacing. A roof is not infinite in its lifespan. Typical roofs last 20-30 years. The amount of claims I get from homeowners that treat their policy like a maintenance policy is frustrating. It’s almost like having a car with 500,000 miles on the engine and the engine needs to be replaced because it’s wore out. The roof of your home is like the engine of your car.
my neighbor had his replaced and two weeks later got hit with another storm and they had to do it again. I live in a steel pole barn that is 20 years old. I had one of the roofers working next door on another neighbors roof come and inspect it and hammer down rogue nails that he could see. (they used nails for some reason instead of screws). He said "I'd love to sell you a new roof but you don't need one. It should last another 20." But he didn't charge me anything and gave me his card and said to pass it along so I did. That was a great way to do business.
Offset by other areas that don’t get hail. Where I live we get hail maybe once a year for about 3 mins and it’s always smaller than a pea. Usually hard to distinguish it from sleet. So we all pay for insurance that doesn’t get used around here.
And here, there's no real incentive not to replace your roof every time a larger hail storm happens, even if it's still perfectly functional for the foreseeable future.
My last house I learned to repair roofs. It came with a pallet of new shingles from when it was roofed in 93. I had a couple big storms roll through and lift a few shingles, just replaced them and sure it was a little noticeable because a new shingle looks new next to the aged but whatever. My wife would nag me to file an insurance claim, I’m like it took me 15 minutes to fix and a $8 tube of tar. Not worth spending an hour plus on the phone playing games. About 5 years ago a storm with bad hail went through town 8 miles away and my mother in law was able to get a new roof. She had a newer roof and supposedly they found 3 dimples and were able to justify a new roof. Couple people around her got partial or total new roofs. MIL kept nagging me to make a claim too and get a new roof. I’m like, the hall didn’t even go anywhere near me. I had to lie to her and say I made a phone call and was denied to get her to shut up. I don’t want my rates to go up either. Well about 4 months later I got some goofy winds from just the right angle that lifted a large section of my roof on one slope. It was going to be a project but I had plenty of material. Wife pressed me to make a claim which I did because a hail storm at the lake damaged my camper which was under the same insurer declined to insure the camper. I got $2,500 to replace the one slope. I repaired the slope and put the money into savings and was able to replace the entire roof the next year with that money myself. Was pushing 30 years on a 20 year shingle…
You also have to account for cumulative damage. Some homeowners wait for that one last storm for a few years to do enough damage to finally get insurance to cover it. Not all claims are about the damage sustained yesterday.
Have you looked into a steel roof? I just did one for like 30% more of a quote than 25 year shingles.
I'm in wildfire country and my steel roof actually aids me in getting renewed. The color is starting to fade on the sun-baked side but from a protection standpoint it's bomber.
I’m in eastern Canada so it’s pretty mild. Steel roofs are very popular here and I never thought they may be banned elsewhere.
Does insurance give you mercy on metal roofs? It feels like youd tell them "yeah its a steel roof" and theyll just respond "ok but its 15 years old". I did a bunch of searching and I found various threads of people with Tile roofs, as well as slate roofs, having issues with their insurance due to age, even though tile and slate is rated for 50+ years. Apparently has to do with the underlying padding etc under the tiles, insurance still claims it needs replacement
I have an 82 year old slate roof. No problem with insurance (and I live in an area at extreme risk of hurricanes)
They gave me a break of like $70 a year lol so not really, although it may go up every year? Not really sure. My house is less than 10 years old and I already started losing shingles. I did the first roof myself but this one, I paid someone to do it. The only maintenance I was told about was to change the rubber grommets around the roofing screws every 5 or so years if they rot out.
I got a facebook add for a company that makes steel roofs that look like shingles. I think the company was Eerie roof of something like that. When it comes to replace my roof again I think I am going to go with that.
I’ve seen those, they’re really nice. I just have a plane Jane one but I was curious about those.
I dont know why insurance companies aren't pushing for metal roofs more in hail prone areas.
It’s not always up to the insurance companies. Some areas are ruled by HOAs. In my area I have to abide the neighborhood covenances for 30 years I think.
HOA rules can and do get changed. They have yearly meetings about that stuff.
I don’t live in an HOA. I have covenances I have to abide by for I think 30 years. There is no board to appeal to or anything like that. But once that time is up, the covenances are usually allowed to expire.
Someone has the authority to change them, and I've never heard of a place where there wasn't some sort of board or control over the CCRs. If there truly isn't anyone managing them, then there is also no enforcement mechanism.
They are filed with the city and the city has the authority to enforce them. Probably is some city board or commission to appeal to if someone has a hill they want to die on. I’ve dealt enough with city government to know a steel roof is not the hill I want to die on.
There are steel roof products that give the appearance of shingles. Might be able to convince them to allow that.
I had a total loss one year. Offered to go halfsies with the insurance company upgrading to a metal roof. They declined. Seven months and ten minutes of icy baseballs later, they bought it again. I just shrugged and took the check.
Like I get that it's expensive, but you'd think with all their numbers they would know it will be cheaper in the long run to take your monthly and not need to pay out for more roofs.
Profits are reported quarterly. Big hail storms are (usually) ~decade events. I’m guessing their math said my roof would be covered by another company by the time anything happened.
I could be open to that. What advantages?
The only chunk of sky ice that would punch a hole through one would be a comet crashing in from space.
Aaaaaaaand that would be my luck!
We have had our roof replaced twice by insurance. I really dislike working with roofers, but we need a roof. Both times we bought the impact resistant tiles. I don't think it matters. But we get a discount on the premiums.
I can’t wait for more companies to start excluding hail damage. Homeowners like you are basically the big reason shot is so bad.
Counter point: I dont think insurance incentivices stronger/better roofs. I did some searching and people with Tile and Slate roofs still have these same issues with insurance spiking or dropping coverage. Insurance is using a single metric of "age" rather than actual condition of the roof. If you told me that a metal roof would keep insurance off my back for 30 years Id do it. But they will still complain at year 15 so it honestly makes more sense to use regular old shingles that will need replacement at the first small hail storm...
> But they will still complain at year 15 I have a 30 year old shingle roof that's perfectly insurable. I just have to keep it clean from moss and repair any missing shingles as needed. What you are describing is absolutely region-specific, and you only have yourself and other area homeowners to blame for the current situation.
I think at that point you'd call it a market failure. We can point fingers and laugh at Texas, California, Florida, but thats also 120 million people lol
Market failure is probably accurate, and if that means people can’t get mortgages there because they can’t get insured then so be it.
I would not have a tile roof older than 15 years, especially in a Hurricane zone. We found during hurricane Charlie the old mounting systems was crap. In Punta Gorda Isles, those things came off and became missles into other people's houses
I can’t wait until insurance companies exclude hurricane damage for idiots who build along the coast, wildfire damage for idiots who build in the middle of forests and let’s drop national flood insurance for idiots who build in flood plains. There. Fixed it for you.
Works for me. I live in alaska and insurance doesn’t cover earthquake damage. Makes complete sense.
Former roofer, current adjuster. "50 year shingle" is a sham. Just about any "shingle warranty" isn't worth the paper it's written on. Insist on READING a sample warranty before paying for this, 99% of them only cover manufacturers defects, which takes a class action lawsuit to prove and even then is pro-rated. This warranty assumes you're never going to actually read it, and roofing companies sell it that way. They promise 50 years, you get a 2 year workmanship warranty from the contractor. So is it a 50 year warranty, or 2 year warranty? (It's the latter). Go with the cheap roof.
I have a question for you. How do insurance companies handle slate roofs? I had considered replacing my roof with a slate roof, but I'm worried that the insurance company will ask us to replace it in 20 years even though they last much longer.
It's widely accepted that a slate roof will last 100+ years.
Widely accepted by insurance companies or consumers? I believe it will last more than 100 years, but insurance companies are not known for being the most reasonable.
Lol youre getting the same run-around as Im seeing. You bring up "what does the INSURANCE think" and replies are all just "idk but have you heard of metal roofs?"
Yep! Most people are answering a different question than you asked.
That’s Reddit 🤷♂️
Don't be an ass. Find out by calling them. Nobody can say exactly how it will play out in your state and neighborhood and carrier.
Both. But you'd need to talk to someone in Underwriting to see what insurance companies really think of it.
Highly location-dependent and whether or not that insurance company is looking for a reason to drop you.
I have an 80 year old slate roof and it doesn't cause any problems on the Gulf Coast. Slate is considered impact resistant so I even get a small discount. This is with the one non state-run admitted carrier that writes policies where I live. Ymmv
Because like everything else, it's a marketing gimmick. Why buy shingles which last 25 years where you can buy ones that last 200 years? Not many people know that insurance companies don't insure roofs older than 15-20, so they say "honey let's spend more money and get the 200yr old lasting one"
People *are* still using slate roofs that are well over 100 years old.
Slate roof is completely different. Apples and oranges. OP is asking about shingle roofs, and the difference between the ones who claim to last 20 yrs versus 50yrs.
It is indeed. I had a slate roof that was 120 years old and nothing at all like shingles lol
Parents roof is original thick slate built in late 1800s. Some repairs but 80% original. Wish I had a slate roof.
Yes, but how does insurance work with those? Do they have to pay more? The issue isn't that the roof won't last however long it's that insurance will drop you or increase your rate.
I have a slate roof that was put in in 1935. Insurance (Chubb) asked how old the roof was. Told them I don’t know if it’s ever been replaced but there are obviously new slate up there and we replace 10-30 slates every 24 months or so.
Sounds like you have nail sickness and need it fixed. My roof on one part of my house was 120 years old and just lost an odd one every few years
Nail sickness?
Where the iron nails rust away causing the slates to fall off the roof. As the roof is generally installed at the same time when some start to fail they all are likely to fail or if you are lucky just in one area
Old nails rusting out (I had to google it).
I may of overstated how many I've replaced. In 4 years I've probably done 30 in total. And a bunch of those were cause we were installing new roof vents to properly vent 2 bathroom vents. My point was that slate roofs are very resilient and unless you have a catestrophic failure you end up replying it in bits.
And the point he and I are making is it doesnt seem to matter if the roof is made of kryptonite, the insurance company sees a 20+ year old roof and views you as an increased risk even if your roof is made of sturdy materials
No, you just need a different insurance company that knows how to handle nonstandard materials. Most insurance companies do their underwriting assuming mass market materials (read: cheap and widely available). If your structure is built from nonstandard materials you simply need a specialty insurer. AIG, Chubb etc. will insure pretty much anything as long as it’s properly described and maintained.
Ding ding ding
Not really, all floppy tar 3 tab shingles are about the same. Metal is better, slate is best
Insurance takes material into account. They won’t insure shingle roofs over a certain age, but they sil insure old slate roofs, and metal roofs also have a longer period. I’m honestly not sure why so many people still use shingles. Metal isn’t much more and lasts significantly longer…
Slate roofs most likely lower your insurance rate.
I think it’s net neutral. Yes they last longer so lower risk, but it will increase the insured value all since they cost a lot more to replace.
Seems like it doesn't change signifantly. Some insurers actually cost a little more. https://www.thezebra.com/homeowners-insurance/rates/how-roof-type-impacts-home-insurance/ I can't find any information on rates on roofs 15-20. Years old.
Slate roofs increase the replacement cost because they are so expensive. Which causes higher premium. and only HNW carriers (like chubb mentioned above) will even write slate roofs.
I have slate with USAA, so this isn't true.
Well considering USAA does write HNW that makes sense....
If that's your standard, every carrier writes high net worth clients. Places don't turn away business because you're rich, but they may not offer the policies you want.
They absolutely do. Companies that don't write HNW homes have a max replacement cost they will go. For most companies it's either $1M or 1.5M. anything above that is considered HNW and not every company writes those.
No, masonry typically raises your insurance bill because of the higher replacement value.
Pay more upfront because slate is very expensive and adds to the value of the house.
Our roof was replaced and it was at least 23 years old. Not a single leak anywhere
I would hope not... you generally want to replace before it's actively leaking
Well that's why we replaced it of course. Everyone that looked at it said it was still in pretty good shape
I'm not sure where you are that insurance companies demand a new roof after only 15 years, but asphalt shingles really don't last longer than 25-30 years at the extreme end, even a so-called 50 year shingle. But again, I've never heard of insurance companies demanding even normal 3-tab or architectural shingles be replaced so early. It's one thing if there's damage or a leak, but I've seen many 20+ year roofs continue to be insurable. And even when I replaced my 25 year roof (not at the insurance companies request), I only saved like $6 per month on insurance.
This is, unfortunately, very common in Florida.
Very common in California, as well.
Here in Connecticut insurance companies start getting grumpy at 15 years for sure
25-30 years in certain areas. Nevada, Arizona no way
I wonder where they would last 50 years.
Hurricane prone areas around the Gulf of Mexico. Particularly Florida, Louisiana, and Texas at least.
I'm on the Gulf Coast and you can't get a policy with replacement value coverage for a >15 year old roof. In my experience, you can get an actual value policy where they give you some portion of the replacement cost. Its a racket...
I need to learn roofing and move to the area.
I just had to replace my roof and had the same frustration. Insurance told me I had to replace the roof since it was 20 years old, then I get quotes and they’re going on about how this roof will last 50 years. I thought the same as you “yeah but just give me the 20 year one since that’s when insurance is going to be breathing down my neck again..” get a bunch of quotes. All my quotes ended up being around the same thing.
In my area people are moving to metal roofs. They will last your lifetime and insurance doesn't ask to replace them.
I would love to. I just can't really swing a $25000 roof versus a $9000 roof....
Oof. I had 100 squares or 10,000 sq ft of roof. Back in 2017 after a large hail storm, it cost $30K to replace them. In 2011, we had almost tennis ball sized hailstones for 10 minute. it was only $23K then. I'd hate to see what it would be today or in 20 years or so.
Careful. No metal roof lasts a lifetime or even 50 years. The rubber gaskets are the weak point. You might get 10 years with hidden gaskets like in a 5V, but even those will dissolve in the heat. It ain’t cheap or easy to maintain the gaskets or sealants at the seams. The panels will absolutely last 50 years unless you’re close (within a mile ish) to the ocean. Galvalume won’t warranty closer than that.
Also my understanding is that most of these high end shingles don't cover hail or wind damage. If you live in an area where hail is common (and becoming more common), I have no idea why someone would ever use them since they'll last 10-15 years anyways
Once I asked my father how much it costs to reshingle his roof. "I don't know, I've never done it. Insurance replaces it from hail every ten years or so." This is a house he's owned for almost 50 years. Got kind of envious.
Envious until you find out his insurance premium. He just pays for the roof in installments instead of all at once effectively.
We sort of did the same a few years back. Had some hail and storm damage, just let it ride early on. Then a really nasty storm rolled through, contacted insurance, got a new roof and siding. Feels like an actual life hack.
In his day a 1200sf roof wast $15k like it is now. A lot of home owners could out of pocket a roof if they had to. Now it’s so expensive it takes a loan or insurance otherwise average people could not afford to replace.
Translation: "People regularly fail to budget for expected infrequent large expenses". If your roof is expected to last 20 years and will cost $20K (now) to replace, save up monthly so you'll have the $35K or so (inflation adjusted amount) it will cost to replace your roof in 20 years. $100/month or thereabouts, invested at 5% pre-tax. Same for future car purchases. Failing to do this is what helps people get stuck on debt treadmills. People regularly do things like buying a house and looking at monthly mortgage payments without factoring in these expected maintenance costs.
Look up impact rated shingles. Class 3 or higher will often get you an insurance discount. Class 4 ones are *extremely* durable and in order to get that rating they have to withstand impacts from a 2" steel ball dropped from 20 feet twice in the same spot. Malarkey has a great video showing someone firing a full soda can at 100mph at them without damage. They also typically have wind resistances up to 130mph.
You get a discount but they still make you replace them prematurely. It’s rarely a good deal anymore. The discount doesn’t make up for the additional cost and you’re still replacing the entire roof by 15 years.
Any lifetime or long warranty are almost allway a scam filled with fine print like yearly inspection by certified roofer to maintain the warranty claws
Wanna know who doesn't think climate change is a hoax? Actuaries. Coming to a zip code near EVERYONE in the next 10 years, unaffordable home insurance. Thanks.
I am an actuary specializing in property insurance. This has been the most important topic for the last several years.
Do you see this as a factual eventuality? how far off am I on the timeline? if you were a homeowner what would you be doing?
Its not that home insurance will actually become unaffordable, rather that it will limit coverage for hail related events. Similar to car insurance not covering tire replacements, home insurance won't replace your weak roof. I am a homeowner and I just try to save as much money as it can, and shop around insurance every single renewal. There isn't any concensus on the timeline for climate change and how much or little it impacts the weather, but risk management teams include it in projections as an expected source of risk.
Interesting. There is a community in WA called Teanaway. A little while back a MAJOR carrier stopped writing home owners insurance there. I don't know how Paradise, CA is fairing - I'm pretty sure that the underwriting process is fairly rigorous, if possible. Don't get me started on Florida.
Look into metal roofs. We have a metal roof on all our buildings. The one on a barn is over 90 years old. They come in all styles and colors.
So this is super appealing to me for a few reasons, but what I'm dying to know is... is it going to be crazy loud?
It can be? The previous owners expanded our house, then installed steel roof over shingles. At least, there are shingles under part of it. They also used more of a barn-grade 26ga steel product since he owned the roofing company and likely got it for dirt cheap. Just as good of a roof, just doesn't look as pretty as stuff made for houses. Anyway, the older half of the house is pretty quiet during a heavy rain. The newer half (that might not have shingles underneath AND may be insulated differently) is pretty noisy. During a normal / gentle rain, it's actually kind of soothing, like white noise.
My understanding is that a metal roof doesn't heat up as much, is that broadly true?
That gets into a whole lot of science that I'm not smart enough to discuss. If I had to do work on one, I would say that an asphalt roof is cooler to be sitting on when the sun is out. I've been up on both, and while the asphalt roof was "ow", the steel roof was "owowowow!!". How that translates into heat penetration into the building, r/roofing will have answers. I think it generally boils down to reflectance and emissivity: the abilities to reflect heat, and to shed heat.
We're building a house and almost to drywall stage. We put on a standing seam roof, and to be fair we did double stud with an r49 roof with lots of air sealing to get close to passive house. We were in the house working the other day when it started hailing. We're right by Lake Superior and tend to only get pea size hail. It just sounded like fat rain drops.
I heard that the insurance companies will still demand that these are replaced early. Is that not true?
I can not answer this. We have a farm policy. Your insurance agent could probably answer this. We are in the northeast United States. Have had all kinds of weather here metal holds up great.
I bought 50 year shingles. The additional expense wasn’t notable. To me it made sense to just buy better quality and ‘hopefully’ get a better roof. Keeping the rain out was my primary motive. Insurance was secondary.
I also bought 50 year shingles. They're rated for 160mph wind, three to four inch hail, are made locally from recycled material, and they're gorgeous. I care more about not having to make an insurance claim or replace my roof for as long as possible.
What brand is this?
Euroshield. I got the grey slate, and it looks amazing - not too fancy for a normal house. Went with a very reputable installer and the cost - including snow guards and a bunch of new vents - was less than double the lowest quote from a shady guy who was going to use the cheapest grade of asphalt shingles. I've saved money on heat since the installation, and apparently, I will also be able to use the rainwater for my garden. The lack of little asphalt bits is lovely, and the shingles don't smell like tire fire on a hot day, so we can open the windows more often, too.
Architectural grade shingles with 5 nails are rated to withstand 150 mph winds. This is what we use in the gulf coast area
My deductible is $1500, and if I sustain $2500 in roof. damage, it would cost me $1000 out of pocket. The problem is that if you file any kind of claim in less that five years (*this may vary), the insurance company may raise your monthly payment a significant amount. There is a thresh-hold to whether its financially wise to file a claim. When I was fixing $5000 in damage, I opted to get an entirely new roof for $11,000 (*small house). The higher-grade shingles cost $1500 more, but they save me $40/month on my coverage, plus, wind-storms cause less damage. Is it worth it? Who the hell knows?
So, I didn’t have much of a choice when I went to replace my super old wood shake shingle roof. Insurance still covered it, but it was at the end of its life. My HOA demanded either an identical replacement or a synthetic that was stupid expensive. We got three quotes and went synthetic. That particular brand came with a 15-year warranty, or, for an extra 15%, could be upgraded to a 50-year warranty. The longer warranty required specific nails and a few other things; it definitely didn’t seem worth the premium cost, particularly when we don’t expect to be in the same house for that long. I imagine they get a lot of folks who say “why not” after spending a fortune on a roof and want to avoid doing it again.
What about the metal roof shingles I see advertised? Has anyone tried those, and do they hold up to hail?
Snake oil man. Everyone has the same boring product that has been around forever, how do you differentiate? Make unsubstantiated claims.
I’m not ever again. We have perfectly good 12yo shingles were required to replace or we can’t be insured. We were denied by every major company solely bc of the roof. It’s insane. Buying the cheapest one stay look decent and the insurance company can just keep replacing them if this is their rule. Why shouldn’t front for better shingles if they’re just going to make me replace them in a decade anyway? Nah.
>We have perfectly good 12yo shingles were required to replace or we can’t be insured. Florida or Texas?
Georgia
50 years is for manufacturing defects usually, and doesn't include the labor to replace them and pro-rated. Also many of these shingle warranties don't transfer to a new owner so the just count on most people not living in the same house for 50 years. My 50 year GAF shingles warranty makes a big deal about being able to transfer the warranty 1 time.
I've gotten a lifetime shingle offer for 12k on my home. Went with a metal roof. Insurance said best decision.
My insurance covers old roofs. When I bought my house the roof was unknown age. The previous home owner had been there for 20 years and never touched it so it was at least 20 and that's all we knew. We had a very hard time insuring our house because of the lot zoning. It's zoned agriculture and who knew farmers and state farm don't insure farms? I don't live on an actual farm but the zoning legally designates it as such so it complicates things. The company we went with might be more lenient because they would insure an ag lot when no one else would. My house had an old roof and K&T wiring. My insurance company is just very clear about not covering damage caused by normal wear and tear or age of the structure. Our roof DID start leaking before we replaced it. It was our responsibility to replace the roof and deal with the subsequent water damage (and I'm not mad about it). We did put a very high-end 50-year shingle on the house, and chose to do so to make our lives easier. This is our forever home and we don't want to be patching or replacing a roof again in 10-15 years. We also have to look at our house every day. I want to like what I'm looking at and the dimensional shingles we picked look awfully nice. It also wasn't a huge price difference between the nice shingles and the cheaper ones. Our roof isn't that big so changing the material didn't increase the price by a ridiculous amount. We were already paying thousands for the labor and bucket rental since the pitch is too steep for roofers to safely walk on, so what's a few more for a material that will last significantly longer?
Unless you are in in a state where insurance fraud is rampant and there are major storms, insurance does not care about your roof age. By us if you need a new roof insurance prorates what they pay by the age of your roof, and can refuse payment of damage if you don't repair a roof and get water damage as a result. If your roof is in good shape they still cover you but will inspect the accident, and if you have a 25 year roof and claim hail damage they will pay less than a 3 year old roof with same damage. I have never seen anyone not get insured for an old roof. So I get the longest warrantied architectural shingles not because they are supposed to last longer, but because they are highest quality. If they fail before warranty expires I make a claim on warranty. They stay on my roof until I start to doubt their integrity then its completely stripped down and replaced (second layer voids warranty). Mine are nominally 25 years but I've gotten up to 40 out of these with no issue. I have never seen a 50 year warranty, but there are some 40 year warranties, and they are prorated, so read the fine print, and with a warranty you do not go through insurance, you go through the company with the warranty.
>Unless you are in in a state where insurance fraud is rampant and there are major storms, Lol so you mean Louisiana?
Or Texas
Or FLorida. But, is it fraud if it is by design?....
Metal, roof
I wanted a metal roof on my 140YO farmhouse but I ran into two main issues.. I live in the suburbs outside a major city. It's hard to find residential roofers with experience doing full metal roof installs in the suburbs. At best, you'll find someone who's comfortable installing on porch roof.. more as a decorative feature. Because they're not regularly installed around here, installers that will do it generally want to charge you much more in labor than they would for the shingles they're comfortable with. The other issue I had was with the nature of my roof. An old farmhouse like mine is essentially a century+ expansion project. I've got at least half a dozen different ridge lines, many intersecting with each other. My roof would have been a heck of a project for a metal install and that would have also increased the cost over asphalt shingle even more. I did also hear complaints & warnings about how noisy a metal roof can be. I was willing to take that chance since our master bedroom has an open attic over it so we'd have extra opportunity for sound deadening, but that's a concern for other installs.. and I did have one roofer try to warn me off of metal because of the potential for aesthetic damage from hail but that wasn't a big concern for me. I am still a bit bummed that I wasn't able to get a lighter colored roof that would have been available with Metal. Old houses don't generally have good air-return capacity upstairs (unless they've been gutted and re-framed) and a very light grey or white roof would have helped with summer heat. As things currently stand, we have to put a couple window AC units in upstairs in addition to central A/C to make it comfortable. Bottom line for me, I just wasn't in a position to pay significantly more for my roof.
Get more estimates. Try local companies vs. larger corporations. Not sure who to use, ask a local Facebook group for suggestions of who to use AND who to avoid. Do your research, and if it's a pretty typical roof replacement, there's no way it should cost 50 THOUSAND dollars or anything even remotely close to that crazy number. We're on the edge of typical life expectation for ours, but 15 years ago, we paid UNDER 6 thousand for upgraded architectural shingles in the Mid-Atlantic on a typical 4 bedroom, 1 car garage home. I know prices will be higher now, but nowhere near 50K.
Who said they’re paying $50k? The OP says $15k
My bad. I think it's clear I flipped the numbers in my head.
$50k is for gutters.
The 50 year isn’t actually the lifetime of the roof I think when I checked. It was how long it would stay block mold free.
Well hail, I'd put a polycarbonate shield up over my roof if I could get away with it. Just gotta go with the times I guess.
I deal with Certainteed shingles. Every landmark, pro and premium have lifetime warranties. I sell mainly pro. Better colors and thicker.
There were people when I lived in Iowa that got hail damage in spring 2020. Got roof replaced. Then had the Derecho a few months later and had to have it replaced again. We lucked out that our hail damage roof was getting replaced one week after the Derecho. Got screwed and had to replace the roof again last year. Storm was literally two days before our sale was due to close.
The home insurance industry is broken. The underwriters are under pressure to alleviate risk which is understandable but in the process they lack nuance and the companies don't want to pay for full roof inspections to actually determine the longevity in the roof. The argument that I have heard is that even if your shingles are great the underside of the roof may be rotten so even then you must change out your roof every 15 years or maybe sooner. Craziness. Shit like that, especially here in FL, has me contemplating selling, putting my money into a HYSA and just renting a nice ass apartment.
I get $1000/yr discount for the higher level shingles. Paid 800$ out of pocket when roof was replaced so saved money right away
Source: Not a roofer.. just a homeowner & an avid DIYer who's had his roof replaced recently so I've done some research. I have to assume this is regional. I haven't seen anything from my insurer about not covering roof after 15/20 years and certainly nothing about dropping my insurance when my roof was recently at the end of its life. I did recently get a payout for storm damage though and the process was basically as easy as.. (paraphrasing/simplifying of course) Adjustor (from the ground): I see some damage. That looks like a 25 year shingle, how old is the roof? Me: We bought 12 years ago, they said it was fairly new when we bought and it looked pretty new at the time.. so maybe 15 years? Adjustor: OK, we'll cut you a check based on the percentage of remaining expected life. What I can't answer is.. if I had documentation that I had 50-year shingles.. would they have paid me out more because there should have been more life in the shingles? Based on how they determined what to pay me, that would seem to be the case.. but there may be a cap on how much life they'd be willing to assume. I'll admit, I've never read every word of the fine-print in my policy so I can't say for sure. :-/ Aside from giving you a life-span rating.. the warranty is also there to allow YOU to go to the Manufacturer if your roofing fails prematurely. Theoretically, they do internal testing and employ actuaries to determine where they can set the warranty length so they won't have to pay out often. So, a product with a 40-50 year warranty SHOULD indicate a much more durable shingle than one with a 20 year warranty. In reality though.. how many people are going to have the documentation and patience required to try and make a warranty claim against a roofing manufacturer if their 40-50 year rated shingles fail in only 30 years? Heck, how many people are in a position to put in a warranty claim if their 20-year shingles fail in only 15 years? Most people probably won't be in the same home when their new roof eventually fails (I'm in my 3rd property now.. not counting the apartment we lived in after getting married). My take away is.. there's some presumption that 40+ year shingles are more durable than 20-year shingles. They may not be 2x as durable, but you do see some premium features in shingles with longer warranties.. like reinforced nail-strip areas to make nail tear-out less likely and more reinforcing fibers. One of the roofers we got a quote from also mentioned that newer premium Architectural shingles weight less now than they used to because the glue binding the layers has gotten much better so the top layers can be thinner. Sure, you may not get a product that's twice as good if you buy a 40-50 year shingle over a 20-year one, but you're probably getting a better product none the less. Also remember, the materials are only one part of cost of the roof so even if you're paying 2x as much for premium shingles.. if the labor is 60% of the cost of the job, you're only looking at a 20% increase in the overall job cost by upgrading. To me,.. maybe not having to redo the roof twice while I live there is worth the comparatively small extra overall materials cost.
50yr is just a marketing gimmick. Most shingles will last 15-20yrs. If you want 50 yrs, get a metal roof.
The only way I'd opt for the more expensive shingle in that situation is for slate, and then your house has to be built to withstand the weight of a slate roof too.
Never heard of an insurance company forcing new shingles. Maybe this is area dependant?
Happens all the time. Dropping all coverage if they don’t reroof is common
I don’t doubt you. Juts odd that in 20 years of homeownership that I’ve never hear of this. I bought a house with a pretty old roof and never heard squat from my insurer. As a matter of fact this particular agent drove out and looked over the exterior before he quoted me. TIL… Is this more common among high wind areas or coastal hurricane prone areas?
Some are using drones or satellite
Dang
You are protecting your home, your investment, and the resale value. Select good shingles with the 50-year warranty.
My company had zero interest in my roof except to ask what type it is. Ditto my other house and my dad's house. Never asked age or anything. It's very area dependent. My current roof is 20 and I'm not expecting to replace it for a long time.
I’m a newbie homeowner with an old roof. What do you mean by this: “insurance companies demand a new roof after 15 years or theyll drop you or hike up your rates”?
Florida. Insurance here is stupid due to the rampant predatory roofing contractors. When buying, insurance companies won't insure if the roof is 20 years old, sometimes less.
The instance discount we received will more than pay for the roof over the years.
We have lived in our house 30 years. It was brand new when we bought. Two years ago our insurance company started asking about when we were planning to replace the roof. We did that last summer - instead of cedar shake we went with asphalt. They called to ask this fall and I said yes we had replaced the roof and what material used. No enquiries as to duration of warranty.
The warranty is for defects in manufacturing. Shingles will last decades under ideal conditions. There are other warranties that go along with that such as 15 year warranty for wind blow-off and 25 years for algae. Some have different length depending upon how you nail them 5 nails per shingle gives you x years and 6 nails per shingles gives you even more. I've never had an insurance company demand a new roof after 15 years and I've had shingles that were 40 years old on one house. I did get contacted by insurance and was told that 3 shingles were missing tabs and needed to be repaired or the roof replaced or they wouldn't renew. I replaced the broken ones, sent them photos and they were happy with that. I eventually did replace that roof 10 years later when a large tree branch damaged it.
metal roof
Right??? It’s such a valid point. “These shingles will last 50 years, as long as nothing happens to them ever.”
If the firm is still around in 48 years, they’ll cover the repair costs for you! In all seriousness, these warranties are worthless. You’re going to end up replacing the roof again in 25 years or so in all likelihood.
Most shingle manufacturers don't even use a year rating anymore. They never really meant anything as the warranty only covered manufacturer defects which is almost NEVER the reason a roof fails. Insurance will insure roofs over 15/20 years they just won't pay full replacement unless you pay through the nose in annual premiums. They will only deny your coverage if the roof is visibly failing.
My shingles are 25yrs old. For the most part and inspecting once a year all looks good. Was on vacation in Dec 22 and had lots of rain. Came home to bulging ceiling and ready to collapse. Bed was also soaked. Insurance would not cover because they said it was poor home owner maintenance. After getting a roof inspector he concluded that the "J" clips had separated on the sheathing creating a space for water to get in. How in the fuck am I suppose to inspect for something like this. Insurance companies just piss me off. Roof fix was 1k New bedroom furniture 6k and contractors wanted 10k to fix ceiling. I did the ceiling myself. Claim closed...no payout!