Sunday, February 21, 2016

Roofing in Paradise

Today was sunny day in Florida.  It was in the mid 70s in February perfect for finishing off the roof for the cedar covered porch.   If any of you have roofed in August in Florida then you know that in August you will burn your ass when you sit down on the roof for a few minutes.   However today it was winter in Florida and I went to work on the roof in an old pair of shorts and a t-shirt.

The square footage of the roof  is about  400 sq feet or 4 squares in roofer terms.  Due to the fact that hurricanes are an issue in Florida and the house I'm renovating is on a barrier island connected the main land by causeways, the code requires that the shingles be wind rated for 150 Mph on my street.  One street over its 160 Mph....go figure.  The shingles I chose are CetainTeed silver birch shingles which will easily handle these wind speeds according to the manufacturer ratings  ASTM3161 D F......(I'll believe it when I see it and right now I'm skeptical as they are asphalt shingles and this material is pretty weak).   The shingles are energy star rated which was nice for taxes as it is deductible under the residential energy credit according to the HR block tax software I use.  They also glue themselves together when the heat works on them over time making that much harder to blow off.

I finished 4 squares of shingling in one weekend or about 7 hours total installation time.  Preparing the roof for the shingles was about 12 hours time.  The total cost for the job was $709 which includes $365 for shingles, $5 for coil roof nails, $48 for drip edge, $144 for peel and stick, $28 for flashing and $39 for tar.  Permitting costs were $80.

So as I sat on the finished roof and watched dolphins make waves as they hunted for fish in the canal and bikini clad women paddle by on their on paddle boards I wondered why in the world is roofing an allowed task in paradise?  It kinda sucks.

After a quick search on the Florida building department website and google I found that $310 per square was what it would cost for a contractor to shingle my roof.   Which means the total cost would have been $1240.

My savings then was a whopping $531 or 43%......Cue cash register sound.

Happy building

The Dr
















No comments:

Post a Comment