Roof Replacement & Reroofing

Plenty of roofs we are asked to replace do not need replacing, and we say so. If the roof is under roughly fifteen years old, the shingles are still flexible, and the problem is localized — a leak at a chimney, a lifted section after a windstorm, a failed pipe boot — then a repair is the honest answer even though it is the smaller invoice.

Replacement becomes the right call when the failure is systemic rather than local. The clearest indicators are widespread granule loss with black asphalt showing through, shingles that crack when lifted rather than flexing, curling and cupping across whole elevations, and sealant strips that have released so broadly that wind lifts shingles by hand. At that point new material will not bond reliably to old and every repair is a temporary one.

Two existing layers is an automatic replacement, because there is nothing left to repair onto and most jurisdictions will not permit a third. Age plus a pending sale is another common trigger — a roof at the end of its life is one of the first things a buyer's inspector flags and one of the largest price concessions a seller ends up making.

And then there is hail. A roof can be structurally fine and still be a total loss in insurance terms, because bruising has compromised the mat across the whole surface even though nothing is leaking yet. That is a genuine replacement, and it is one an insurer will usually fund.

The most valuable hour of a roof replacement is the one immediately after the last old shingle comes off, when the deck is bare and everything that has been happening under the roof for twenty years is finally visible.

What we look for first is water damage: soft, spongy or delaminated sheathing, dark staining, and outright rot. It clusters in predictable places — the eaves where ice damming has repeatedly forced water back under the shingles, the valleys where volume concentrates, around chimneys where the flashing was reused one time too many, and under any penetration whose boot failed. We photograph everything and show you before replacing it, and decking is priced per sheet on the quote so the rate is agreed in advance and only the quantity is discovered.

Second is the structure itself. Sagging between rafters, cracked or under-sized members, and previous repairs done badly all show up now. Older Calgary bungalows often have 1x6 board decking rather than sheet plywood, which is structurally fine but needs different fastening and occasionally an overlay of sheathing to give the shingle a continuous nailing surface.

Third is everything that was never done right. Bathroom and kitchen fans terminating into the attic rather than through the roof — extremely common, and a direct cause of attic moisture and mould. Soffit vents buried under blown-in insulation, which starves the intake side of the ventilation. Old flashing sealed with caulk instead of being formed properly. With the roof open, all of it is quick and cheap to correct. Once it is closed, none of it is.

With the deck sound, the roof goes back together as an engineered assembly rather than a covering. Ice-and-water membrane goes down first at the eaves — past the code minimum, because ice damming here is a certainty rather than a risk — and in every valley and around every penetration. Synthetic underlayment covers the remaining field.

New metal follows: drip edge at eaves and rakes, valley metal sized to the volume it carries, step flashing where the roof meets a wall, counter-flashing let into the chimney rather than smeared with sealant, and new pipe boots on every penetration. Every one of those is new. Reused flashing is the most common false economy in this trade and the most reliable source of a five-year leak.

Ventilation gets corrected at this point because it is the only convenient moment. We calculate intake against exhaust, clear blocked soffit paths, add intake where there is not enough, and set ridge or roof-line exhaust to match. An attic that cannot breathe will shorten the life of whatever shingle you just paid for, and it is the single most common defect we find on Calgary roofs.

Then the shingles, installed to the manufacturer's specified nailing pattern — placement, count and depth. That pattern is what the wind warranty is written against, and it is the difference between a careful installation and a fast one. Finally the ridge cap, and a walkthrough with you before anyone leaves.

Most residential re-roofs in this region are one to two days on site. A simple bungalow can be done in a day; a large, steep or heavily cut-up two-storey with multiple valleys and dormers takes two or three. Acreage homes with big footprints take longer again. We give you a firm range before you commit and we tell you what would change it.

The disruptive part is the tear-off, and it is genuinely loud — you will hear every footstep and every scraper. Most homeowners work elsewhere that day. Pets are best kept indoors and away from the affected side of the house. Anything hanging on walls directly beneath the roof deck can vibrate loose, so it is worth taking pictures and mirrors down the night before.

Before the first shingle comes off, we protect the property: tarps and plywood over landscaping, decks, patio furniture, air conditioning units, windows and siding. On lane-access inner-city lots we sort out bin placement and material staging with you ahead of time, because there is often exactly one workable spot.

The job ends with cleanup and a magnetic sweep of the driveway, lawn and beds — nails are the thing homeowners find weeks later if a crew is careless, and it is the single easiest measure of whether a roofer respects the property. We also register your material warranty and hand you the workmanship warranty in writing.

A large share of the roofs we replace in this region are paid for by an insurer rather than the homeowner, because hail is the most common trigger for replacement in Alberta. The process is more navigable than most people expect, but it rewards doing things in the right order.

Have the roof inspected first, before you open a claim. We will tell you honestly whether the damage is real and claim-worthy, so you are not filing on a roof that simply aged out — insurers do not cover wear, and an unnecessary claim on your history is not free.

If it is claim-worthy, we photograph systematically: bruising with a scale reference, granule loss, cracked shingles, and corroborating impact marks on soft metals like vents, flashing and eavestroughs, which are what establish that a hail event of a given size actually occurred at that address. That evidence package goes to your insurer with measurements and a written scope.

We then meet your adjuster on-site and walk the roof with them. Two people looking at the same damage and agreeing on it in person is what prevents most disputes. Once the scope is approved, we build to it, and on most approved claims the homeowner pays only their deductible.

Worth knowing: hail rarely stops at the roof. The same storm usually dents eavestroughs, cracks siding on the storm-facing elevation, and hits the detached garage. Because we do all four trades, one scope covers the whole property rather than three contractors submitting separately — which is materially easier for an adjuster to approve.

Replacement demand in this region runs in waves by housing era and by storm. Whole 1990s subdivisions — Hidden Valley, Riverbend, Douglasdale, Somerset — hit their first replacement together. Early-2000s suburbs like Tuscany, Evergreen and Panorama Hills are working through theirs now. And every significant hail event resets the schedule for whatever corridor it crossed.

We replace roofs across all four Calgary quadrants, north through Airdrie, Crossfield, Carstairs, Didsbury, Olds, Bowden and Innisfail to Red Deer, Penhold and Sylvan Lake; west through Bearspaw, Springbank, Cochrane, Bragg Creek and Canmore; south through De Winton, Okotoks, High River, Diamond Valley and Nanton; and east through Chestermere, Langdon, Strathmore, Beiseker, Three Hills and Drumheller.

One scheduling note worth planning around: after a major hail event, every roofer in the affected corridor books out within days and material supply tightens. If a storm has crossed your area, an early inspection is worth far more than an early phone call in three weeks' time — even if you decide to do nothing, you will know where you stand and have the damage documented with a defensible date.