Your roof may look fine from the ground, but hail, even small pea sized hail, can cause damage to your shingles and other parts of your roof that you may not 'see' from inside your home.
Your roof is more than just your shingles or shakes, it is also all of your vents, and the flashing used to seal it against water leaks, as well as your HVAC, which also has flashing to protect against water intrusions. Your gutters may have debris in them, which will cause a back up of water should we see another storm on top of this one.
The only way to know if you have damage, or potential water leaks, is to have your roof inspected by someone you can trust. Your Realtor or Insurance Agent should be able to direct you to someone they know to be reputable.
But just in case someone knocks on your door trying to scare you or offer you something for nothing, here are a few tips:
- Only accept bids from local licensed contractors. Colorado requires a business license, but contractors must obtain their contractors licenses in the towns and counties they work in.
- Check, are they a member in good standing of the BBB?
- Only accept bids with price, scope of work and materials written on them.
- Homeowners have a 72-hour rescission/cancellation period. Typically contracts for insurance claims will have 2 cancellation clauses. The 1st gives you, the homeowner, 72 hours to change your mind and cancel. The 2nd states that should your insurance claim be denied you have 72 hours to cancel the contract. These two clauses are to protect you!
- Never sign anything that has a cancellation fee!
- Request 5 local references that the Estimator personally worked with.
- Go online, check Yelp, Bing, Google, Facebook, do they have reviews?
- Ask for copies of the roofers Workmen’s Comp. & General Liability insurance.
- Make sure the name on the insurance certificate matches the name of the roofer.
- Make sure the roofer pulls a building permit and has the new roof inspected.
- It is illegal for a contractor to offer to pay, waive or rebate your deductible. There is no way around this, if your insurance company believes that the roofer has offered, induced, or found a coupon that will waive your deductible, than the insurance company may decide to not pay your claim, UNLESS you find a new roofer and pay your deductible.
- Never turn over insurance checks or pay any money until the job is complete, unless you need to make a small down-payment for materials when they are delivered.
- Do not pay for materials in advance. At best, when materials are delivered make a down-payment that does NOT exceed the cost of materials.
Here in Colorado Roof Brokers has been offering unbiased roof inspections since 1992. We are accredidated by the BBB, in fact they've even awarded us the Longevity Award. We're also members of the Colorado Roofing Association, and the Aurora Chamber of Commerce. Check out our website as well as our Facebook, we always welcome comments and feedback on how we are doing.
If you have any questions or if we can help you in any way, just let us know.
