Two years after we bought our town home, the roof started leaking. Prior to that my husband’s coworker spent $3,000 for a mold clean-up in his attic and his home insurance didn’t cover the damage because it was “poor workmanship.” So the poor guy had to pay for the clean-up and for roof replacement.
Our roof was contractor grade and it was beyond warranty. Traumatized by what hubby’s coworker had gone through we decided to just skip the patching process and just replace the entire roof. Luckily, it wasn’t a big roof. We called a local roofing company for an estimate and didn’t even get a return call. I called again and the second time I got an appointment but they didn’t show up not even a call! I got tired of calling so we decided to just ask a quote from Home Depot. We figured that if the local company didn’t even have time for a sales opportunity, how much more for if we needed to have something looked at if we had roof issues down the road? We know the big box store is going to cost us more but at least they will be around or have a better probability that they will be able to honor the 10 years warranty as long as they are still in business. I can say that we are happy about that decision when we had issues, I called a 1800-number and the next day someone was on the roof. They replaced the flashing of a tube coming out and it was all good.
A friend recently bought a house and he too replaced his roof. We did recommend Home Depot and not fool around for peace of mind. He wanted to save some money and called a local guy instead. Communication was good between him and the contractor during the pre-install and installation phase. Our friend started to notice leaks and he called his roofer. Roofer didn’t call back for a while and then after several weeks he calls back and says he’ll check out the problem. Roofer appears and “fixes” the problem. It rained and roof still leaks. Our friend calls again and again, no answer from the roofer. In the end, he called Home Depot and after an inspection, he was told that his roof leaked because the wood under the new shingles were rotten. So the entire new roof has to be replaced. They can only guarantee their work. So off came down the new shingles and all rotten wood replaced. It ended up $6,000 down the drain. But at least when he called post-installation, he spoke with someone and he got it fixed.
So in this case, spending a little more saves money and frustration in the long run. Anything that involves post-sales/installation support should be done by companies who have been around. A new roof is a huge investment and so why risk it?

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