Hurricane season roof prep checklist

The checklist we run on our own houses before June

Hurricane season officially opens on the first of June, and the useful preparation happens in April and May. Once a system is named and in the Gulf, every roofer in Tampa Bay is booked and every hardware store is out of tarps. Everything below is worth doing while nothing is happening.

• Clear gutters, downspouts and any flat-roof drains completely
• Photograph all four elevations of the roof in good daylight and save them off-device
• Check and re-secure loose fascia, soffit panels and ridge vents
• Locate your policy number, deductible amount and your roof’s install date

The photographs are the part people skip and the part that pays off. A clear, dated set of images of an undamaged roof is the fastest way to establish that damage came from the storm and not from ten years of deferred maintenance. Store them somewhere that survives losing the phone.

Know your deductible before you need it

Florida hurricane deductibles are usually a percentage of the insured value rather than a flat figure, which surprises people badly at the worst possible moment. On a home insured at four hundred thousand, a two percent hurricane deductible is eight thousand dollars out of pocket. Knowing that number in May changes what you decide to do in September.

Everyone remembers to buy water and batteries. Almost nobody remembers to photograph the roof, and that is the one that costs thousands.

If anything on the checklist turns up something you cannot resolve yourself, get it handled before the season builds. A loose ridge vent in May is a twenty-minute repair. The same ridge vent in a fifty-mile-an-hour gust becomes the opening that lifts a whole slope.