8. What is the process for re-roofing my house?

The first step is to know the condition of your roof. If you’re reading information about re-roofing, roofing contractors, roofers, or other related information is very likely that you know that your roof might need attention. To learn more about signs that indicate that you need a new roof, read our article: “Does my roof need to be replaced?”. After establishing the fact that your roof might be towards the end of its lifetime then you’ll need a professional roofer to take a look at it. Contact us to schedule an appointment.

We recommend getting 2-3 estimates from roofing companies. After you decide which roofing contractor will be doing your re-roofing project you should expect the following process:

• Sign contract, receive construction lien notices, choose shingle color and get an estimated project start date.
• Depending on the complexity of the job and the roofing contractor, materials might be delivered and staged on top of the roof a few days before the project starts.
• Prep work. Before the tear off starts there might be some required prep work: protecting landscaping, installing safety boards if the roof is steep and moving yard furniture and pots are examples of prep work.
• Tear off. The first step of replacing a roof is the tear-off, this is removing all the old roofing material down to the roof deck.
• Inspect roof deck. After tearing off the old shingles the roof deck needs to be inspected to make sure there is no mold, and that the plywood is in good shape in order to install the new shingles. NOTE: Some houses with wood shake roofs do not have a plywood roof deck, they have skip sheathing; in these cases, plywood needs to be installed over the skip sheathing.
• Install underlayment. Once it’s confirmed that the roof deck is in good shape, roof underlayment needs to be installed. It is recommended to install ice and water shield on valleys and roof penetrations.
• Install roof flashings and shingles. After the underlayment is in place, the shingles are installed, first the starter shingles, then regular shingles and at the end the hip and ridge cap shingles. In this step roof flashings are also installed as well as venting components.
• Clean up. This step should be done right after the tear off but after roof installation the roofing crew should do a final clean up, using a magnetic roller to make sure that no nails or staples are left behind. The goal at Portland Quality Roofing is to leave your house as clean as it was before we started the roofing job.

Now you have a general idea of the process of re-roofing your house. Contact us to take the first step, we will do everything in our power to make sure your project goes smooth from beginning to end.