Hi there everybody! Hey maybe you're a brand-new homeowner or maybe you're a
longtime homeowner and you're wondering what kinds of things you need to do to
maintain your roof. Maybe even you just got a brand new roof on your house some
time ago and you're wanting to know what should you do to help take care of it so
we're gonna talk today about the seven roof maintenance tips that all
homeowners really should do.
So I'm Tracy Bookman owner of Homestead Roofing and you may be a brand-new
homeowner you may be a longtime homeowner and there are things that you
should know about that you're gonna have to do to maintain your roof maybe it is
that you just got a brand-new roof and that more than likely has come with a
workmanship warranty could be anywhere from one year to two years up to seven
years maybe it's even a lifetime workmanship warranty however there are
going to be maintenance things that you as a homeowner will need to do so that
way you don't void the warranty it's very similar to other industries for
instance like if you get brand new carpet installed the carpet installer
probably has requirements that you need to do so that you don't void the
warranty such as having your carpet professionally cleaned once a year. So
getting a brand new roof is really no different but even if you don't have a
brand new roof and you own a home there are these specific things that you need
to do to take care of your roof now all of these things aren't going to apply to
everybody because not everybody has all the same accessories on their roof but
there are some basic things that are going to apply to everybody that you as
a homeowner need to pay attention to. All right well let's go ahead and start with
the things that will apply to every homeowner because practically every home
is going to have gutters and a lot of times those gutters are in areas where
they're going to collect leaves debris pine needles all that kind of stuff so
one of the most important things that a homeowner has to do to help maintain his
roof is to keep his gutters clear. Now you can do that yourself there are
actually some really simple tools that you can buy to help you clean out your
gutters on your own. Now we actually do have a tool that I like it's got a
paddle on one down and a scoop on the other and so that you can again put that
on a telescoping pole put your ladder up and you can actually clear out about 12
to 15 feet of gutter just from your having your ladder in one spot but it is
very important you don't want your gutters to get all clogged up with
leaves and debris because what happens then is then your water doesn't have
anywhere to go it ends up just getting stalled in the gutter can't make it to
the downspout so if then if you get a high volume of
water from rain or from snowmelt or something like that
that water can actually start to overflow the gutter and it can also back
up underneath the shingles and start to come down through either into the soffit
or into your house very important to keep your gutters clean. Another thing
that every homeowner is going to need to pay attention to is your pipe jacks now
a pipe jack is just simply a flashing that sits at the base of any pipe that
comes up out of your roof most of the time it's for your sewer vent pipes your
sewer vent pipes are those typically the PVC pipes that you're going to see
sticking up out of your roof and a lot of times the flashing at the base of it
is like black rubber with a metal skirt underneath it well what happens with
those is that neoprene especially here in Colorado in our harsh Colorado
environment that starts to break down and it actually doesn't take very long
for that to start breaking down those things can start degrading after just a
few years so it really is important for a homeowner to keep an eye on those
things check those out I would recommend that you take a look at those things
once a year. Two different things can happen those can actually start to break
down and fall apart and so and here's actually some photos of pipe jacks that
we've seen on ruse that we took photos of and you can see how degraded these
things are and all that's doing is just opening up a huge spot or even sometimes
just a small crack for water to get down into your attic the other thing that can
happen with a pipe jack is over time that that rubber can start to contract
and pull away from the pipe and like you can see on this pipe here there's about
an inch and a half to two inches space between where the top of that rubber
boot used to be and where it is now and that boot is just loose on there and
it's still doing the job of sealing but at some point that's going to have to be
replaced so that way water can't creep down in between the pipe and that boot.
Item number three that everybody's going to need to
pay attention to is exposed nail heads. Now you're gonna have nails that are
going to be visible at the bottom of pretty much every exposed flashing so
like at the bottom of your pipe jack, box vents, skylights, any of your furnace
pipes the the flashing at the bottom of those but you're also going to have
exposed nails along the ridge where the ridge lines terminate and they have to
nail those down and they can't cover those with another ridge single so
there's almost always going to be a visible nail head at the end of a ridge
or where they cap off a ridge or a hip. So while you can't avoid having visible
nail heads those nail heads shouldn't be exposed they need to be sealed off with
silicone or another product that is going to prevent water from essentially
following that nail down through the shingle down through the wood decking
and into your attic. You as a homeowner should be aware come up on your roof and
just hit those with a little bead of silicone so the fourth thing that use a
homeowner really need to pay attention to be aware of is ice damming. Now
obviously this only applies if you live in a colder climate if you live in
Florida you're not going to have to worry about ice damming but here in
these northern colder climates ice damming is a real problem now we have
other videos that explain what ice dams are and what causes them so we're not
gonna explain that in this video we will link to those other videos at the end of
this and in the description below so I recommend that you go watch those but
you as a homeowner need to be aware that if you see ice damming occurring on your
house you need to take care of it get it off of your roof because again as that
ice dam builds up its going to start forcing water back up underneath your
shingle which could very easily follow a nail and come back down through your
roof again either in your soffit which would be preferable or it's going to
come down inside your house which is not so preferable. So again tip number four
is you've got to be aware of ice damming and get that off of your roof eliminate
the conditions which are going to cause an ice dam so snow sitting at the eaves
sitting in valleys you got to get that snow out of there.
So item number five again is going to be something that virtually every home is
going to have honest so you're going to need to pay attention to it and you can
see behind me this is the furnace vent pipe oftentimes in addition to a furnace
vent pipe there might be a water heater vent pipe there also might be like a gas
fireplace chimney pipe all of those things need to be paid attention to
especially these furnace pipes because they can start to rust up there at the
top where the cap connects to the actual pipe itself if that starts to rust you
can start to get holes in there sometimes very large holes and that can
start to extend down that pipe water can get in there and then follow
the pipe down into the area wherever your furnace is the other thing that you
need to pay attention to on these is that collar so there's a collar
oftentimes that sits right above the pipe jack and that's just to protect to
prevent rain and water from getting in between the pipe jack and the pipe
itself well sometimes those collars can start to move around and shift and then
they're not providing that seal anymore and you can just again you can hit that
with some roofing or weatherproof silicone to seal that off. Maintenance
item number six not going to apply to every single home but it will apply to
most homes because most homes have what are called valleys now valleys I don't
know if I can get it where you can see yeah right here so we've got a valley
right here behind me. A valley is just where two downwards sloping roof pitches
intersect. Now most newer re-roof jobs those
valleys are going to be closed meaning you're not going to see exposed flashing
like you can see on this one but there is still flashing in there and so the
valley still needs to be maintained it still needs to have attention paid to it.
Now on this particular valley that you can see the thing that needs to be
attended to on a valley like this is those pine needles didn't need to be
kept clear of there and if at all possible standing snow needs to be kept
out of those valleys. There are different products that you can install on your
roof that will melt standing snow and keep it out of the valley but
the big thing is pine needles, leaves, and debris sitting in that valley especially
if it's an open valley where you've got metal in there because you can see
what's happening on this is that standing water is causing that metal to
start to rust again that can start to work little pinholes in it or larger
holes cracks that kind of stuff and water is going to come down through
there if there's not ice and water shield barrier underneath that valley
then you're going to have problems with water coming into your roof in that
valley area so it's important to make sure that these valleys are maintained
and kept clear of debris stuff and standing snow. Now my last maintenance
tip tip number seven is one that I absolutely hate this accessory this roof
accessory and that's skylights you can see skylights on this roof behind me
here and the reason that I hate skylights
well their blessings and curses right? It's great to have them up there to give
you light into an otherwise kind of dark room but in my opinion skylights are
just awful. Now so skylights take special attention because you've got to make
sure you can see that there's flashing along the side of a skylight and at the
top and at the bottom. The bottom ones not so much of a concern except for the
exposed nails that need to make you need to make sure are sealed but the sides
and the top flashing on a skylight have to be maintained they have to be have
attention paid to them because things can sit along the side of a skylight
like you can see there's pine needles sitting next to the skylight here those
can get wedged in between the shingles and the flashing sit there and hold
water and then that starts to rust that metal out and then of course up at the
top of the skylight debris leaves pine needles love to sit up there and again
the exact same thing is going to happen it's going to start rusting out the
flashing that is designed to keep water from getting down into your roof.
Attention has to be paid to that you have to maintain those things. Well the
other thing that I really hate about skylights is the seal between the
frame of the skylight and the glass itself now when those come from the
factory typically those are really well sealed and you're not going to get water
into them the frames around them although they were good when they were
installed what happens or what can happen is as the house moves and
contracts well the frame of that skylight is shifting and that seal can
be broken even if it's just like a hairline break in the seal you're going
to get water into that skylight. So how can you maintain skylights well check
them regularly reseal around the glass but one of the best things that you can
do for skylights is if you've got old ones like this replace them with new
ones with especially with the Velux skylights. So I hope this video has been
helpful for you hopefully it's the answer some questions that you may have
on what you need to be doing as a homeowner to maintain your roof if
you've got any other questions about this topic or any other topic or you
would like to have somebody come out and kind of give you an evaluation of what
things need to be done to maintain your roof if you're not wanting to get up and
do the maintenance yourself because you don't like to be on your roof and you
want somebody else to do it for you please just give our office a call you
can call our phone number right up here 719.433.6991
you can also visit our website that's right down here homesteadroofing
colorado.com if you like this video if it's been helpful for you please
consider giving us a big thumbs up we'd also love to hear from you leave a
comment in the comment section down below let us know what you thought about
this video let us know if we missed anything if there are things that you
think need to be done to maintain your roof let us know down in the comments
section also please subscribe to our channel and click the bell icon up there
so that way you get notified when we've got new videos until our next video I'm
Tracy Bookman owner of Homestead Roofing.
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