Long Beach, CA
Storm damage, and what to do first
The first hour after a storm is about stopping water, not about getting the best price. Those are two separate jobs and they happen in that order.
Describe the storm damage job
Three questions, then the address. Up to three Long Beach contractors who do this work.
You are on the list.
No provider in Long Beach is taking requests through this service yet. We are lining them up, and yours is kept until one can.
- Nobody gets your details yet. Your request stays with us and is not passed to any company.
- One email when someone can help. When a provider covering your area can take it on, we email you once and ask whether you want that company, by name, to contact you.
- Deleted after 90 days. If nobody can take it on, or you do not say yes, your contact details are deleted 90 days after your request.
- You decide, or you do not. There is nothing to cancel and nothing to pay us.
Nobody will call you about this request unless you say yes to a company by name.
Before you let anybody on the roof
The things worth pinning down on a storm damage job. A contractor who has not raised them has not looked properly.
- Whether the contractor is licensed and insured in this state
- A local address you could actually drive to
- Photographs of the damage before any work happens
- What the emergency tarp costs, separate from the repair
- A written scope of the work, line by line
Damage that matters is often invisible from the ground. Bruised shingles, lifted seals and hairline mat fractures fail years later, long after the storm is forgotten.
Keep every receipt, including the tarp and the emergency call-out. They are part of the record of what happened and what it cost.
Do not sign anything on the doorstep. Read any contract twice before you sign it; most home improvement contracts in California can be cancelled within three business days.
Locally
Behind it: morning fog that sits on the roof until mid-morning. Damp that arrives every morning and leaves by lunchtime is worse for a roof than rain, because nothing ever fully dries between one and the next.
About storm damage here
Why does ventilation keep coming up?
Because a badly ventilated attic cooks the roof from underneath and takes years off it. Intake at the eaves and exhaust at the ridge, in balance. It is cheap during a re-roof and awkward afterwards.
Does being near the ocean change what goes on the roof?
Yes. The specification that matters here is metal, not shingle. Ask directly what the fasteners and flashings are made of; in salt air that answer decides how long the roof lasts far more than the brand of the covering.
What if the decking is rotten underneath?
Some of it usually is. The important thing is that the price per sheet is agreed in writing before the tear-off, so the conversation on day two is about quantity rather than rate.
Is this really free?
Yes. You pay nothing, now or later. Roofing contractors pay us for the introduction, which is why the service costs you nothing and why we are upfront that it is how we make money.