FAQ

Most land between $350 and $1,500, and small ones caught early start around $200. Orange County runs at or above the wider Los Angeles market. What moves it is whether the deck is already wet: a leak caught at the first stain is a flashing job, and one left for two winters is a carpentry job.

One that has not reached the structure. If the stain is small, dry between rains and the sheathing above it is still sound, that is a minor leak and a few hundred dollars. Once the decking has softened or the insulation is wet, it stops being minor regardless of how small the stain looks.

No, but it is a useful symptom. A roof that only leaks in driving rain is usually failing at an upstand, a skylight curb or a lap that is perfectly watertight under vertical water. That narrows the search a long way before anyone gets on the roof, so it is worth telling us.

Sometimes, and it is often a false economy. Roofing work in California requires a CSLB C-39 license above a small dollar threshold, and the reason most leaks get fixed twice is that the first attempt sealed the stain rather than the entry point. Ask whoever you use how they intend to find it.

Someone who will go in the attic. On a low-pitch roof the water enters at a junction and travels before it drops, so the hole is rarely above the stain. Anyone who quotes from the ground, or from a photograph, is guessing at which detail failed.

Composition shingle, twenty to twenty-five years. Concrete tile, fifty or more -- but the felt underneath it, twenty to thirty, which is why tile roofs leak with the tile still perfect. Skylight sealant is the shortest-lived part of most roofs here at ten to fifteen years.

Because most online figures are national. Asphalt shingle is about $8.50 per square foot across this market against roughly $4 nationally. A quote that matches a national average is usually missing something -- most often the tear-off or the sheathing allowance.

A repair usually does not; a re-roof does. In this city it comes from the City of Fullerton, and in Brea from the City of Brea -- both are their own incorporated cities and neither goes through LADBS. We pull it, and the inspection that comes with it is your independent check that the specification was followed.