Eventually, every home will need a new roof installation. Every home in the world must face the elements and, eventually, the materials used in construction will need to be updated.
Roofs, in particular, need to resist the constant heat and UV of sunlight along with the occasional onslaught of seasonal storms. Over a decade or two, usually between 15 and 20 years, a roof will take enough damage and experience enough wear that every shingle will need to be replaced simultaneously.
This is why any home will eventually need a new roof installation, not just repairs.
But what you may not know is that there are more benefits to a newly installed roof than simply taking good care of your home.
Home maintenance is a noble goal, especially in Canton MI where the seasonal storms and winter snows can’t be ignored. But there are several unexpected and under-appreciated benefits to installing a new roof on your house. And today, we’re here to show you that this necessary chore is a far greater opportunity than you could imagine.
The Many Benefits of New Roof Installation
1) Improved Curb Appeal
There’s nothing quite like the joy at the end of the day and see your home coming into view or the pride you feel when tending the lawn on a Saturday afternoon.
Delight at seeing your home doesn’t have to be a purely personal feeling. Every homeowner is happy when their home is the pride of the neighborhood or looks lovely next to other attractive homes on the street.
This is curb appeal, how beautiful your home looks both objectively and nestled into the neighborhood you live in.
When it comes to curb appeal, the roof tends to slip into the background next to the color of your front door and the elegance of your front yard landscaping, but it still has an impact.
A shabby roof will make the entire home look shabbier and bring down the ambiance of a neighborhood. On the flip-side, a brand new roof that is vibrant in color and gleaming in the sunlight can make your home the crown jewel of your street.
It will make your home look brighter and better kept overall with clean lines and sparkling shingles.
2) Resale Value
Of course, your curb appeal is more than just about aesthetics. No matter how much you love your home, eventually you will probably sell it to change location or practical household size. When that happens, your resale value will matter.
Fortunately, real estate value almost always goes up and most homeowners make at least a small profit on selling a home.
However, the resale value of your home is also based on the age and quality of essential structural features, like your roof. A home with an old roof that needs regular maintenance will sell for less.
But a home with a recently reinstalled roof, possibly still under warranty, can sell for tens of thousand dollars more than it would otherwise. Your roof installation can’t help but increase the value of your home, increasing your profit whenever you choose to sell in the future.
3) Energy Efficiency
As a roof ages, it also loses integrity. Your roof resists the elements with layers of infrastructure. The support beams hold your roof in shape, followed by the underlayment and two or more layers of shingles. Over time, the shingles come loose or warp. With each damaged shingle, moisture gets in and your HVAC hot or cold air can get out. This, ultimately, lowers your energy efficiency.
When air is escaping from your home, it’s like leaving a window cracked that you can’t close. Your AC or heater must work extra hard to keep your home filled with comfortable conditioned air because some is escaping through your roof.
Older roofs almost always have attics that are closer to the outside temperature than what the thermostat is set to.
With a new roof, on the other hand, every shingle is perfectly in place and well-secured. A new roof installation ensures that your home is tightly sealed, preventing your AC-cooled or furnace-heated air from escaping.
This makes it easier for your HVAC system to heat or cool the home and therefore saves electricity you were previously losing to air leaks.
4) New Roofing Technology
Twenty or more years can pass between the time a home is built and the first time it needs a roof installation, and another twenty years to a new roof after that. During that time, a lot of product development can happen.
The technology used to produce high-quality roofing shingles has progressed a great deal in the last twenty years.
This means that your new roof will guaranteeably be higher technology and more efficient than the roof that was originally installed.
Modern roofing shingles are better made and are more capable of resisting the elements than the shingles that were installed fifteen to twenty years ago.
When you get a new roof installed, you will gain all the efficiency and strength benefits of the latest roofing technology.
5) Health Conditions
Missing shingles aren’t the only consequence of an old roof. Many old roofs develop mold, moss, and mildew growths. This can create unseemly discolored patches on the outside of the home but what happens on the interior is far more important.
Mold growth on the inside of a roof and its rafters can be dangerous to the residents inside the home. This is an especially high risk in regions where leaves falling in autumn can create protected damp piles on the roof and melting mounds of snow create an equally moist and inviting environment.
Mold spores that release indoors can get into the sinuses of residents causing a variety of symptoms depending on the mold species and an individual’s sensitivity.
Common symptoms include sinus irritation, shortness of breath, and headaches, but more severe conditions can develop with particularly dangerous strains of mold.
A new roof installation not only strips away any old shingles that may have been corrupted with mold, it also gives your roofing professionals a chance to fully inspect and even rebuild any infrastructure underneath the surface that may be infected with mold.
If moisture let in by your old roof or harbored by leaf piles has left you with a mold problem, a new roof will ensure that every scrap of roof mold is removed and replaced with fresh materials.
6) Warranty Renewal
Everyone loves a warranty. Warranties give you peace of mind about the quality of your new roof because the manufacturer and/or the installation crew are guaranteeing their work.
When your roof is under warranty, some or all of any near future issues will already be covered by someone else’s policy. Flawed shingles that can be proven flawed may be replaced free of charge and any issues with your recent installation might even be covered for discounted repairs for a few years.
Many shingle manufacturers put their products under warranty for a decade or more to show how confident they are that your shingles will last a good long time. And most singles last up to twice as long as their warranties.
This means two things. The first is that your old roof was almost guaranteeably out of warranty by the time you need replacement.
The second thing is that once you have a new roof, you can also enjoy the relaxing fact of a brand new warranty.
A new roof installation is done with all-new shingles, meaning that each shingle is coming with a decade or more warranty coverage.
And you might even get a warranty coverage from your roofers guaranteeing the quality of their installation or offering discounts on your first few maintenance visits.
7) Insurance Discounts
One of the best benefits of a new roof installation is one that your insurance provider would never share with you: This year is the perfect time to get a new quote on your home insurance policy.
The cost of home insurance is determined with a large number of factors including the age of your house, inspection results, and how likely the insurance company deems your home to experience disaster.
So what, exactly, do you think will happen to your insurance cost with the addition of a brand new roof? A new roof increases your home’s energy efficiency, security, and structural safety. Calculating for these things, it’s only natural that your insurance costs should go down. However, this will only happen if you get your insurance policy reassessed. Otherwise, your insurance agency will be more than happy to keep asking the same price each month.
Once your new roof installation is complete, be sure to get a new quote on your home insurance and renew your policy with the new price.
8) Easy Maintenance
Both you and your insurance company should be delighted about this next benefit of a new roof. Maintenance will be much less demanding.
A new roof installed by skilled professionals is far less likely to take damage in a storm, for instance, than an old roof with many loose shingles and shingles that have been worn down by years of withstanding the elements.
The granules on a new roof will be fresh and strongly attached to each shingle, making it more resistant to the sunlight while the glue and nails used to attach each shingle will be in top condition and well-affixed.
In fact, you don’t even need to schedule inspections and minor repairs as often for a new roof as you do for an old one. Every other year or even every three years is often a sufficient maintenance schedule for a recently installed roof unless your roof has recently withstood a particularly harsh storm.
Even so, you are less likely to need repairs because a new roof is more capable of holding onto its shingles and resisting high winds than an old roof. This means that a new roof both needs less maintenance check-ins and fewer repairs even when damage does occur.
9) Creative License
Of course, improving your home’s integrity and resistance to the weather aren’t the only perks you get from installing a new roof. Many homeowners don’t realize, but a new roof installation is the perfect opportunity to personalize your home in a way that has, so far, been impossible or impractical.
You can repaint the walls, replant the yard, and decorate any time you like, but when else will you get the chance to change the color or even material of your home roof?
As long as you don’t have an HOA (or stay within your HOA rules), a new roof is your opportunity to exercise some truly incredible creative control over your home. Ever want to change your roof color?
Become the most notable home on your block by breaking the mold or subtly change the entire look and feel of your home by choosing a new roofing shingle color. Or, if you’re enamored with a new kind of roofing shingle like clay tile or new eco-friendly options, now is your chance to make a change.
10) Expert Installation
The last great benefit of a new roof installation for your Canton, MI home is the value of a highly skilled installation. Many homes built in the last 50 years were built quickly in large batches, often with less than perfect construction techniques.
If your roof was installed hastily or by someone who was not a master roofer, you have the chance to permanently improve the quality of your home based on who you hire to install your new roof. Higher quality roof installation combined with the latest roofing technology can mean that your new roof can provide a better home experience than you have ever had before.
From energy efficiency to strength in the face of Michigan storms, a new roof is more than just a necessity. It can be the best thing you’ve done for your home this decade. Contact us today if you’d like more information on the benefits of a new home roof, to discover your options for new roof installation, or to find local roofing experts in your Canton, MI neighborhood!