We keep walking into the same story. The kitchen or the bathrooms got remodeled first, the line of credit is tapped out, and then the old roof leaks right into the new work. Here's why the roof goes first.
We've gone on more than one appointment that goes like this. The homeowner just finished the kitchen, or the bathrooms. New cabinets, new counters, new floors, fresh paint. They used their line of credit to pay for it, and it's tapped out.
Then the rain comes. The old roof leaks, and the water lands on the brand new work. Now they're calling us asking for a tarp.
I get why it happens. The kitchen is the room you live in every day. The roof is the thing you never look at. But the order matters, and getting it backwards costs real money.
A new kitchen doesn't keep the rain out. The roof does.
Every room in the house sits under the roof. If the roof is near the end of its life, anything you build under it is at risk until the roof gets done. New drywall, new cabinets and new floors don't hold up to water any better than the old ones did.
Water doesn't stay where it gets in. It runs along the framing and shows up somewhere else, sometimes in the room you just paid to redo. More on that in how we track down a leak. By the time you see a stain, the insulation and the drywall above it are usually already wet.
Brea: a ceiling that came down after a roof leak was put off too long. Not one of the remodels in this post, but this is what water does to finished drywall.
A tarp buys time. That's all it does. It's a stop until the roof gets done, not a fix. And when the line of credit already went into the kitchen, the roof ends up waiting under that tarp for money that isn't there anymore.
Tustin: an emergency tarp we put on a roof. It keeps the water out for now. It isn't a fix.
If you're thinking insurance will cover it: if the roof leaked because it wore out, don't count on it. Policies usually exclude wear and tear, and your policy and your insurance company decide what's covered.
Get the roof looked at first. Before you sign for cabinets, have a roofer tell you how much life the roof has left. Our estimates are free.
If the roof is due, do the roof first. Then remodel under a dry roof. Our roof replacement timeline walks through what happens, in order.
If the budget only covers one, it's the roof. The kitchen can wait a season. The roof can't wait for the rain.
Tell each contractor about the other. If the remodel adds anything that goes through the roof, like a bathroom fan or a range hood vent, it's easier to plan it with the roof work than to cut into a new roof later.
That's the work we do: shingle roof replacement, tile replacement with new tile, tile lift and relay, and flat roofs. If the money is the hard part, we offer financing through Synchrony on approved credit, so the roof doesn't have to wait behind the kitchen.
Fix the roof first. Then build the kitchen you want under it.
Have the roof looked at first. Free estimate, in writing, with how much life your roof has left. We do asphalt shingle roofs, tile replacement with new tile, tile lift and relay, and flat roofs across the Inland Empire.
(909) 819-8394