I recently ran into a client who was in the metal materials business and wanted to know how he should budget for a new metal roof. After the conversation, I remembered my father’s favorite quote: “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing!”
This client wanted to know how the prices of different types of metal roofs would vary and had an idea of the size of his house. I’m sure he had a calculator handy as we chatted. It was a referral from another client and he asked me if he remembered what his friend had spent. I answered with my best recollection and he wrote down the number. Quickly inputting the value into his calculator and multiplying it by her estimate of the size of his roof, he came up with a number: “About $15,000 then,” he announced. Which was adequate for a 3000 square foot roof for a job with the same type of roof chosen by his friend… Assuming a similar scope of work. They asked me to go out and do an accurate measurement and adjust the prices. Upon arrival, I was reminded once again that taking on anything is a risky proposition in the roofing business.
Sure enough, his house was about 2,500 square feet, much the same as his friend’s, but that’s where the similarity ended. There was also an attached garage that she had forgotten to mention. Oh, and its roof had a covered porch that extended on 2 sides, AND a covered patio, AND it was a 2-story house, AND it was mostly a 12:12 slope! Almost everything that could be different between two “similar” jobs was! As it turned out, the material package would be almost 70% larger for his job than her friend’s, and due to the complexity and slope of her roof, the labor would be DOUBLE per foot. square. Your work from him for the same material done by the same contractor would be almost 3 TIMES the price! Guesses out the window….
For the uninitiated, there are a bewildering number of variables that can affect the final price of a roof renovation job, and simply knowing the size of a job is just one of a host of factors. In this case, the fact that his friend’s job was an easy-to-walk 4:12 slope meant there was almost no similarity in the time it would take the roofer to install each square foot of material on the steeper slope. ceiling. That’s why roofers have designations for roof pitches that are generalized as “walkable pitches” (usually 7:12 or less) or “non-walkable pitches” (usually 8:12 or more). These alone can make a big difference in the time it will take to install a given roofing material. In addition, the details in a roof (dormers, roof-to-wall intersections, skylights, solar panels, etc.) mean a great deal of time and additional detail that a given job will require and these can have very important effects on the final result of the project. workforce. we have a job
At the end of the day, each roof renovation project is its own scope of work and must be priced individually. Don’t make the mistake of using the area of your home as the final variable in the price of a new roof. You need to do your homework and quantify all other considerations that need to be included in the completed job. Websites like retech101.com can be great assets in helping you determine what those variables will be for your job and helping you eliminate the shock of knowing that “ballpark” prices have little relevance to most roof replacement jobs.
I remember another favorite quote of mine: “All generalities are false.” Who knew so many interesting quotes applied to re-roofing a house?
