Why is My Roof so Ugly?
You should start looking at roof-tops as you drive through your neighborhood. (Hey, I do it all the time!)
Some homes sit under trees and others sit in the open. Some roofs are taken care of and some are neglected. Some cedar roofs have a light ash grey appearance (nice and healthy!) and some have a pinkish reddish appearance.
Some cedar roofs look repaired for only a short time as the new repairs blend in. Others have a permanent “repaired” look and a reddish pink hue.
Let’s talk about that pink roof.
I believe a homeowner should ask three questions of their roof maintenance company.
- Will my roof look good ?
- Will it work right?
- Will it last longer?
Asking a few questions about the future appearance of your roof, could save you thousands of dollars and a lot of embarrassment.
Once you Stain your Roof, you’re stuck with the result!
Once your roof is cleaned, repaired, and treated with a stain, you’re pretty much stuck with the end result for a long time. Roofs that get stained must be pressure washed; this causes undue stress to your wood roof. Now you’re in for more frequent and costly repairs in the future.
The repairs (those brand new replacement shakes) are then stained, but since they are new they only get coated while the original aged shakes soak up the preservative stain. For the first six months, everything looks uniform but then the stain comes off the repaired shakes and you have a permanently marked roof.
This is very frustrating when your home faces a southwest direction because most of the repairs will be front and center for all to see!
Remember that your shake roof was put on your home to enhance the appearance, not to look like a life long repair depot. The time of reddish, pinkish stained roofs needs to come to a close in Portland.
How do you get your exterior painting scheme to coordinate with a reddish, pinkish roof?
Why We Don’t Pressure-Wash Cedar Roofs
If you have Roof Life of Oregon take care of your roof, we won’t need to pressure wash it! This will save you a lot of money on repairs and increase the life expectancy of your roof. We will treat it with a self cleaning five year preservative that allows the color of your roof to be its natural light ash grey. In addition it will allow all the repairs to blend in permanently and go with any paint color scheme you chose for your home.
Why do they use a color stain anyway? Hmmm!
Inspect Your Portland Roof Every 5 Years
The fact is that a lot happens on your roof in Oregon’s 4 season climates. Neglecting your roof is much costlier than maintaining it properly!
In the summer a great amount of heat is generated and all the building components shrink and shrivel exposing weaknesses not previously noted.
In the fall, as moisture returns to the environment, the roof cools and expands. Then, the rains arrive and somehow all of that movement has made openings that the flow of water follows resulting in leaks. That’s pretty much how it stays through the winter and spring here in Oregon. A lot of water and at times it comes with a lot of wind.
If your home is located under or near tall trees you may need to blow the roof annually with an air compressor to ensure that the water runs down the roof and not across the roof. When water runs across the roof it will find a way into your home as almost all roofing is engineered to have water run down to the gutters.
If your home gets a lot of directional wind the ridge caps at the top of your roof line may struggle to hang on and will need to be checked on periodically.
If your home gets direct sunlight and you have a big southwest exposure you may be thinking that all is well. The truth is that direct exposure will wear the roofing material 2 times faster than a northeastern exposure. Checking for erosion holes and cracks over cracks is a good practice of extending the service life of your roof.
The cost of roof maintenance will always be lower than the cost of neglect, in your time, money and pride of ownership.