Roofing for New Construction and Additions in Livingston County

Livingston County is still building. New subdivisions are going in around Hartland, Genoa Township, Howell Township and Brighton, custom homes are going up on acreage west and north of Howell, and a lot of existing homeowners are adding on rather than moving. A roof on a brand new structure is a different job than a replacement, and it is worth understanding how, whether you are a builder looking for a roofing sub or a homeowner planning an addition.

New construction: getting the first roof right

The photo on this post is one of ours, a new home still in house wrap with the roof going on. A new roof has no old mistakes to fix, but it has its own things to get right, and they are the things a production schedule tends to rush.

• Deck inspection before dry-in. New sheathing is not always nailed to spec, and H-clips and gaps between panels matter. We walk the deck and correct nailing before the underlayment goes down.
• Ventilation designed for the actual attic. We coordinate with the builder on soffit intake and ridge exhaust so the numbers work, rather than putting on a ridge vent and hoping the soffit panels are vented.
• Flashing coordinated with the siding crew. Step flashing at sidewalls, kickout flashing at every roof-to-wall termination, and counterflashing details on masonry have to be in place before siding covers them. On new construction the sequence between trades is where flashing gets missed.
• Ice and water barrier well beyond the code minimum in valleys, at eaves and around penetrations. Code is a floor.
• Timing with the weather. A new home is dried in by the roof. We schedule tear-off-free installs tightly so the house is not sitting open through a storm.

For builders

We work with builders in Livingston County who want a roofing subcontractor that shows up when scheduled, installs to manufacturer specification, pulls its own inspections and does not create callbacks. Our crews are our own, not brokered day labor. We are an Owens Corning Platinum Preferred Contractor, which means new homes we roof with a full Owens Corning system can be delivered to the buyer with the Platinum Protection warranty registered in their name. That is a real selling point on a spec home and a real reassurance on a custom one.

Additions: tying new roof into old

An addition is harder than new construction because the new roof has to meet an existing one. A family room off the back of a Howell colonial, a second-story addition on a Brighton ranch, a garage with a bonus room above it. The tie-in is where these projects succeed or fail.

Matching the shingle

If the existing roof is under ten years old and the shingle is still made, we can often match it closely enough that the tie-in disappears. If the existing roof is older, the new section will look new next to faded shingles no matter what we do. In that case the honest recommendation is often to roof the whole house with the addition. One color, one warranty, one tie-in that is not visible.

The tie-in detail

Where the new roof meets the old, the old shingles are cut back, the decks are married so there is no step, underlayment is lapped correctly from new to old, and the shingle courses are woven together rather than butted. Where the addition roof runs into an existing wall, the wall gets step flashing and kickout flashing that were not there before. We open up enough of the old roof to do this right, and we tell you that in the estimate.

Ventilation for the combined attic

An addition often creates a new attic space that either connects to the old attic or does not. Either way the ventilation has to be rethought. A ridge vent on a new addition that dead-ends into the old roof with no intake is a vent that does nothing.

Low-slope additions

A lot of additions, especially three-season rooms and rear family rooms, end up with a shallow pitch because they have to fit under existing second-story windows. Below a certain pitch, shingles are the wrong product. We spec a low-slope membrane or standing-seam metal for those sections and detail the transition to the shingled main roof so it lasts.

Permits and inspections

Additions and new construction go through the township building department, and the roof is one of the inspected stages. Howell Township, Genoa, Oceola, Hartland, Brighton Township, Hamburg and Marion each run their own process. We coordinate the roof inspection with the builder or the general contractor so nothing holds up the next trade.

If you are building or adding on

Bring us in early, before the framing is done, so the roof and the flashing sequence are planned with the other trades rather than after them. Builders, reach out for a conversation about your schedule. Homeowners, request an inspection and bring the addition plans. We will tell you how the roof should come together.