Did you know that there are over 160,000 injuries related to falls off of ladders each calendar year? That’s why if you own a home, and you’re thinking about working on your roof yourself, you need to keep safety in mind at all times.
In fact, your personal safety is one of the most important roof maintenance tips that we can give you. With that being said, there are 6 other ideas you need to keep in mind if you want to start performing roof maintenance yourself.
In this article, we’ll go over everything that you need to know about maintaining your home’s roof. We’ll tell you what to do, what not to do, and even when it’s time to call on the help of a professional.
1. Perform Routine Visual Inspections
If you own a house, and you’re worried about your roof, the first thing that you need to be doing is performing routine visual inspections on that roof. Taking a look at your roof from the ground outside of your home is a great place to start your roof maintenance, to say the least.
Of course, if your roof isn’t visible from the ground outside of your home, you may need to get a ladder to perform these inspections. If that’s the case for your home, be sure to practice great ladder safety to avoid any major, potentially life-threatening injuries.
2. Perform Routine Ceiling Inspections
Another way to check and see if your roof is leaking or not is to perform routine ceiling inspections inside of your home. Because if you do indeed have a roof leak, that leak is going to eventually cause damage to your ceiling.
Checking for water spots to confirm that no ceiling damage exists is something you should do on a regular basis. It’s also much easier to do that attic or roof inspections, which is a huge plus.
3. Inspect Your Attic for Leaks
Before your ceiling gets damaged via a roof leak, your home’s attic is going to be damaged first. To save yourself the costs to repair your ceiling, you should inspect your attic often for water damage, and roof leaks, to confirm everything looks normal.
How often should you be performing these three routine inspections? That depends on the age of your roof. If your home’s roof is over 15 years old, we recommend that you inspect your attic, ceiling, and roof at least 6 times a year, or every other month.
4. Maintain Your Gutters
Of course, your roof is out in the elements, which means it’s going to need to be able to handle storms and other types of bad weather. While there isn’t anything that you can do to combat something like a hurricane, you can maintain your home’s gutters to better protect your roof from weather damage.
Like roof inspections, you need to make sure that you practice good ladder safety when cleaning out your gutters. Having someone with you to keep your ladder steady is a must. We also recommend that you avoid the process completely and let a professional handle it if you’re not 100% comfortable on ladders.
So, how often should you be cleaning your gutters? We recommend that you clean them every three months, although more frequent cleanings may be needed if you have lots of trees near your home.
5. Perform a Pre-Winter Inspection
Do you live in an area of the country where winter storms are prominent? If so, you need to make sure that your home’s roof is in good condition before winter arrives.
Doing this will also give you something to compare your roof to after winter has passed. That way, should an issue arise, you’ll know that it’s a new one caused by the previous winter.
6. Make Timely Repairs
As soon as you notice that your roof is damaged, it’s important to take care of the issue rather fast. Roof damage can spread, and again, cause damage to other areas of your home, like your attic and your ceiling.
Those repair costs are only going to continue to add up the more your delay making a roof repair. Attacking the issue as soon as you notice it is the best way to ensure that you don’t end up making things worse for you, your home, and your wallet.
7. Lean on the Professionals for Help
We’ve touched on this throughout this article, but it’s important to know what your limitations are. If you’re someone who isn’t comfortable with ladders or doesn’t know a lot about roofs, it’s not a good idea to go the DIY route with your roof maintenance.
If this sounds like you, letting someone else clean your attic and perform routine inspections is more than a good idea. After all, the last thing that you want to do is suffer a fall off of a ladder.
And no matter what you need to have done to your roof, the folks at Newroofplus.com can take care of the job for you. They can even replace your roof with a new one, giving you peace of mind about your roof for the next 10 years or so.
Looking for More Roof Maintenance Tips?
If you own a home, be sure to keep these roof maintenance tips in mind at all times. After all, your roof is one of the most expensive parts of your home to repair or replace.
That’s why you need to make sure that you take proper care of it, so you can prolong its life and reduce repair costs.
Looking for more DIY projects you can do to improve your home? Check back with our blog often for plenty of ideas and information.
