Your first big repair on your own

Where to start when the roof is suddenly your job

Start with the problem, not the contractor. Write down what you know: what you see, when it started, whether water is getting in, and whether there was a storm. Take pictures from the ground. If there is a leak, put a bucket under it and a tarp over it if you safely can, and keep the receipt for the tarp.

Then take a breath. Almost nothing about a roof, a wall or a window has to be decided today. The people who get into trouble are the ones who decide in a hurry. The people who do well are the ones who understood the process before it started. That is the whole reason this site exists.

Questions to ask a roofing contractor, or any contractor

Get two or three companies to look at it. Licensed and local, with a business name you can look up. When they come out, you are not being tested. They are. Ask each one the same questions, and write the answers down while they are talking.

• What is your state license number, and what business name is it under?
• Can I see your liability and workers' compensation insurance?
• Who is my contact after I sign? One name, please.
• Will the full scope be in writing before I sign anything?
• What is not included?
• How do payments work, and in what order?

A contractor who is patient with those questions will be patient on the job. A contractor who gets short with you is telling you something useful now, for free.

What a contract should say before you sign

The contract is the rulebook for everything that happens next, and it is the one place where your protection lives or dies. It should have the full scope, line by line. It should say what happens if they find something rotten, and what that costs per sheet or per foot. It should say how changes are handled: in writing, before the work changes, with a price. It should name the products, the warranty in years, and a start window.

Verbal promises are not in the contract. "We will take care of it" is not in the contract. If it matters to you, it goes on the paper before you sign. Guide 4 has a contract checklist you can hold the paper up against.

How payments should move

You pay for work as it is done, never far ahead of it. A modest deposit is normal, especially when special-order materials are involved. Large payments before anything happens are not. The last payment is your leverage, and it stays with you until the walkthrough is done and the paperwork is in your hands.

One more word: lien waivers. They are the paper that says the people who worked on your house have been paid, so nobody can come back to you later. The contractor's conditional waiver comes with the last check, and the final waivers from every sub and supplier come once it clears. Guide 4 has a payment schedule and a lien waiver tracker so you can see it on one page.

You do not have to decide tonight

Whatever anyone tells you about a price that ends today, you can sleep on it. Read the guides you need. Print the scorecard and score everyone the same way, including the one you liked most. Ask a friend to sit at the table with you, not to decide, just to be a second set of ears. And if it helps to have someone read the bids with you, that is what the next section is for.

Compare the bids, free

Send us the two or three bids you get. We read each one into the same seventeen lines, mark what it states and what it leaves out, and print the questions to ask each bidder. We never rank the bids, never name a contractor to hire, and no contractor sees your files. Free for one project. You are not on your own with this part.

Compare your bids free