The stain on the ceiling is not the leak
Water gets in at one place and travels. It runs along a rafter, follows the decking, and drops through the ceiling somewhere else entirely. Patching directly above a ceiling stain is the most common way a roof leak repair fails, because the hole was three feet uphill.
So we start at the top and work the roof properly. That takes longer than a caulk gun and it is the difference between a repair that holds and one that brings us back in March.
What actually fails on a roof
- Flashing. Where the roof meets a wall, a chimney, or a valley. Flashing is the single most common source of a leak that has nothing to do with the shingles.
- Pipe boots. The rubber collars around plumbing vents dry out and split, usually around the ten year mark, and they leak straight down the pipe.
- Wind-lifted shingles. A shingle that lifted and reseated looks fine from the ground and is no longer sealed underneath.
- Hail bruising. Impact that knocks the granules off does not leak today. It shortens the life of the shingle and shows up later. See the signs of hail damage.
- Decking. Once water has been getting in for a while, the wood underneath goes soft, and shingles laid over soft decking will not hold.
Repair or replace, answered honestly
Plenty of roofs we are called out to need a repair and nothing more. A single failed boot on a roof with eight good years left is a straightforward job, and telling you that costs us a bigger invoice.
Where a roof is genuinely at the end of its life, patching it again is money you will spend twice. We show you what the roof shows and let you decide, and if replacement is the answer we cover that on our roof replacement page rather than making the decision for you.
After a storm
Storm work runs in a specific order. Stop the water, then assess, then repair. If a tree came down on the roof we take the tree off first, which is a thing most roofers have to subcontract and we do not. Emergency roof tarping buys the days between the storm and the repair, and a documented roof inspection tells you whether the damage is worth a claim before you open one.