HOUSTON'S MOST TRUSTED
ROOFING CONTRACTOR

The Roof protects what you care about most, your family! The Roof protects everything underneath, and the education regarding hiring a roofing company is minimal. Some states have taken a very aggressive approach in favor of the homeowners, and others, like Texas, that you will need a license for a haircut but don’t need a license to build a house or build a roof. Homeowners always take the guard down when they get referred by a church member or a family member.

• Verify if they are running a legit business.
• Verify for how long they have been in business.
• Ask for a written proposal.
• Only ever do business with a written proposal and a service agreement AKA Service Contract.
• The service agreement is a guide that will tell you the products used, how many pieces of plywood, warranties, and the terms and conditions.
• If your roofing contractor needs money to buy materials, he is not a trusted roofing contractor. Unless it is a special shingle order and the contractor wants to ensure you won’t back out.
• Down Payment, How do we handle it? We only ask for the downpayment when the materials and our crews arrive to the job site. We only ask for money in advance if it is a special shingle order.
• Never write a check to a person. Always write the check to the roofing company. Don’t take this recommendation lightly for numerous legal reasons, especially if someone gets hurt in your house during the roofing installation.
• Verify Insurance Certificates; are two insurance coverage the most important ones.
• 1- General Liability Insurance
• 2- Worker’s Compensation
• How do you verify the Insurance Certificate information; every insurance certificate has the producer’s phone number, and you can call and confirm the coverages and if the policy is active.  
• Roofing has many branches; it takes years to develop and master specific roofing skills. Beware those companies claiming they are shingles master installers and tile roofers. Very few companies can say that.
• When the work is complete and you’re ready to make the final payment make sure to ask for a non-conditional waiver of lien. This practice could be a helpful resource if your roofing contractor didn’t pay the vendors and contractors.

• Check references; calling customers that have reviewed the business would be ideal. Because if they’re lying regarding reviews means that it is not trustworthy.
• Verify in google if they have an office and a Google Business profile and reviews.
• Check if your contractor is BBB accredited. 
• Check if they have an established location.

That information is essential because you only do business with a legit roofing company. A roofing contractor without an office is like hiring a homeless and believing that he will be there on a rainy and freezing day in the wintertime when your roof is leaking. Therefore, it is best to have an established and dependable roofing contractor you can count on when needed. 

• What’s the reason that Google My Business Profile and Reviews are essential?

Because now, Google doesn’t let you create a Google Business Profile if you don’t have a commercial business address, and the reviews will tell you if the company is legit and the work it is doing.

• The importance of Roofing Google Reviews 

Roofing Google Reviews always will tell you a lot about your roofing contractor, will tell you about his business practices, how he resolved complaints and warranties, reputation, and integrity.

Never associate integrity with the number of reviews because if he has many reviews but is buying those, he is not a person of integrity, and stays away from him.

• When you read those reviews, you can tell the same writing style; 10 or 20 reviews written on the same day with similar ethnicity on the google reviews name.

The Better Business Bureau is constantly monitoring businesses, and their information is very accurate in most cases. For example, a trusted local roofing company understands how to maintain its overhead without sacrificing quality and basic things like an office and proper insurance coverage. On the other hand, an inexperienced business owner will be too flashy with cars and eccentricities that end up out of business when unable to handle their lifestyle. So please never follow the trap that they don’t have an office don’t have insurance because they are trying to keep their overhead low and pass the savings to you. 

If the business does not exist in BBB, it could be because it only has a few weeks of being created or doesn’t exist as a registered business. Here is a small guide on the information you will receive from the Better Business contractor profile.

1. How long they have been in business.
2. Numbers of complaints.
3. How they resolved their complaints.
4. Who owns the company?

1. The importance of the longevity of a business is that running a Roofing Company is very challenging, and only 80% of the roofing business will survive to the first five years, and only 98% will survive to the first ten years and require a certain number of skills such as; 

• Be a good business administrator
• People Management skills
• Good Business Practices
• Product knowledge
• Roofing Knowledge
• Construction Knowledge

2. Numbers of complaints; always a business will have complaints, but beware if you see complaints very often for products and services in BBB. What’s this is telling you that they could be more responsive to their complaints because you expect to file a complaint in BBB when it still needs to be resolved for your roofing company. 

3. How they resolved their complaints; If the roofing company is unwilling to resolve the customers’ complaints, they don’t deserve your money and your business. 

4. Who owns the business; In states like Texas, Roofing is not a License Trade; in other words, anyone can have a roofing business without any expertise in the trade or business. At least with a BBB business profile, you can have accurate information about who owns the company. 

When you’re in the process of hiring your roofing contractor, it is crucial that you make sure that your contractor is insured. It would be best if you took this seriously because it is one of your duties as a policyholder.

Your homeowners’ insurance carrier can only allow you coverage if you hire an insured roofing contractor or if the roofing contractor needs to be appropriately insured. For example, in case that’s an accident or property damage resulting from the roof install, like a fire, or if it rains when the installation is in process, and you don’t have the roof yet. In most cases, your insurance carrier could be denied coverage; every insurance certificate has the producer’s phone number, and you can call and verify the range of coverage and if the policy is active. 

• • Verify the Insurance Certificate, ask your roofing contractor for his declaration page and make sure that it’s not expired. After you receive and review the insurance declaration page is time to do your homework, like calling the contractor insurance producer. These are the two most important insurance coverage. 

1. General Liability Insurance
2. Workers Compensation Insurance

Remember that there are several shingles manufacturers, and some are contractor rewards programs. In addition, other roofing shingles manufacturers like GAF take very seriously whom they handle their credentials, especially their GAF Master Elite Certification.

The top shingles manufacturers you can take seriously are GAF and Owens Corning.

This Shingles Manufacturer has two levels of certification that are:

GAF

1. GAF Certified Contractor
2. GAF Master Elite

OWENS CORNING

1. Owens Corning Preferred Contractor
2. Owens Corning Platinum Contractor

In both shingles, manufacturers have entry-level requirements to earn a very easy minimum, like having an office, registered business, general liability insurance, etc.

But the GAF Master Elite credentials and Owens Corning Platinum Credentials are tough to earn. Therefore, they are extremely cautious about whom they handle their credentials, and the contractor has to pass a rigorous verification process as a background check and credit check. Plus, the feedback from 60 customers for the last three years in a row on customers with their roofing installation under their entry-level certification plus their construction knowledge.

If you live in a state with no roofing licensing requirement, hiring a contractor with these credentials can benefit you as a consumer.

Also, and most importantly, hiring these contractors unlocks some warranties that a GAF Master Elite Contractor and Owens Corning Platinum Contractor can only handle. For example, a GAF Master Elite Contractor can give you a warranty where the shingles are guaranteed for 50 years against manufacturer defects and 25 years of protection against installation errors. Everything is covered by your manufacturer’s shingles, not your roofing contractor.

I know that manufacturer warranties have many gaps. Still, when you get one of these warranties in your house, your contractor has to comply with manufacturer installation standards and provide you with premier shingles, not second-hand shingles, AKA recycles shingles. These, AKA defective shingles, didn’t pass the quality control. But the contractor has to register those warranties and make sure to receive the guarantee in writing. If you don’t have it on paper, you don’t have anything.