Roofing Shingles Prices: Understanding Roofing Costs

Roofing shingles prices are no doubt an important part of roofing costs, but there are other equally important factors affecting pricing decisions. Before that it is vital to know how a roofing contractor arrives at a bid amount for a particular job.

A representative or roofing contractor will visit your home and make visual inspection of your roof. They will determine the number of layers of shingles that need removal, whether the decking has suffered any damage, are they any signs of water damage anywhere inside the outside and around the various features on the roof like chimneys and vents.

After the visual inspection, the contractor will measure the roof to get the dimensions of the roof to be measured. They will estimate the size of the roof. They will determine the number of squares of roofing that needs to be done. They will determine the pitch of the roof and also the complexity of the roof. The more the pitch of the roof the steeper the roof and the level of difficulty of roofing is tougher. The more number of features on the roof like skylights, chimneys, vents and skylights the more the complexity of the roof. All these will add to the cost of roofing as the time and effort needed is more in the above cases. If the home is single storey home then the job of roofing becomes easier. More number of floors make it tougher and more dangerous for the contractor.

The number of squares of roofing that needs to be done will determine the number of bundles of roofing shingles to order. This will determine the roofing materials cost and the amount of money to be spent on shingles. The higher the roofing shingles prices the higher will be the cost of roofing.

It’s not just roofing shingles prices, but the other materials that go into roofing like felt and nails also cost money, next the accessories for roofing including air vents, ridge caps, starter shingles, flashing, gutters will cost money. In some regions putting in a layer of ice and water shield is a necessity to prevent the ice damming effects.

There is doubt that roofing shingles prices will take the lion’s share of the cost of roofing. Another major cost is the labor cost. The cost of installation will include the cost of removing old shingles and its disposal, the cost of installing new shingles, felting and fixing any decking issues. For every extra feature on the roof, you will pay extra as flashing and shingling around these projections on the roof has to be done with care to prevent any leakages. This features take time and effort, so the contractor will charge you extra.

The cost of disposal of old shingles, the cost of cleaning up after the job will be added to the final bid. The cost of transporting the debris, the landfill fee and so on will be included in this cost. It can range from $150 to $300 per square.

The cheapest roofing shingles prices are for 3-tab shingles which cost less than $25 per bundle. The thicker and better quality shingles called architectural or laminated shingles are much more expensive and can cost $75 dollars per square. If you want your roofs to last longer than it is better to buy the more expensive roofs that cost anywhere between $70 to $100 per square. Costs keep changing every year so, you will have to look at today’s prices. Roofing felt costs less than $10 dollars per roll which comes in different thickness and different lengths. The 30 pound felt and !5 pound felt paper are the two thicknesses of felt used in roofing.

Armed with roofing shingles prices, the prices of labor and other material costs you are in a better position to under the bids submitted to you by different roofing companies. Companies have to add a little extra to cover their overhead costs. A comparions of different costs will give you an idea if the bids submitted are reasonable and the mark-ups are okay.

There are ways to cut down on the above costs. If you so desire you can order all the materials yourself with supervision of the roofing contractors. You can hire dump truck and haul away the ripped out shingles and cart it away to the landfill. Contact your land fill to know about landfill fee.

Unless, you have 5 bids it is difficult to do the right comparision of roofing shingles prices and other costs. To get these bids you can ask references from friends and families. It is also easy to get leads from new developments in your reu cogion where roofing companies are doing the roof jobs. Yo u can also get names from your local building association.

When it comes roofing remember cheapest is not the best. Roofing contractors need to know their job and have training and skills to do a good job. Well installed roofing shingles will last several decades. Badly done jobs don’t last as long and you pay a lot for repair or replacemtn of badly done roofing jobs.

As you see from the above discussion roofing shingles prices are not the only factor affecting roofing costs. There are several other factors that make a big difference to roofing prices.