Hiring

Choosing a roofer in a state with no roofing license

Roofing has a low barrier to entry, a high ticket, and a sales culture that arrives with the weather. In Texas it also has no state licensing, which removes the check most homeowners assume exists. Most companies are fine. The checks that separate them are quick, and none of them depend on knowing anything about roofing.

What "no license" actually means

Texas regulates a number of trades at state level — plumbing through the State Board of Plumbing Examiners, and a long list of others including electricians through the Department of Licensing and Regulation. Roofing is not among them. There is no state roofing license, no state roofing exam and no state roofing registration to check.

Three consequences follow, and they are the reason this page exists:

1. Anyone can print a truck decal. The gap between a settled local company and a crew that formed last week is invisible from the outside, and it is not closed by any state database.
2. "Licensed and insured" is half a claim. Insured is real and verifiable. Licensed, for roofing in Texas, refers to nothing. This site’s own standing sentence says so deliberately rather than borrowing the phrase.
3. The burden shifts to you. What is left to verify is insurance, a bond, a real local presence, references, a written scope, and permits. All of it is checkable in an afternoon.

What to verify

Insurance, from the insurer

General liability and workers’ compensation. Ask for the certificate to be sent to you directly by their agent, naming your address as the job, and then call the carrier listed on it — which is exactly what TDI advises. A contractor without workers’ compensation coverage can leave an injured worker looking at your homeowner policy.

A bond

TDI’s post-storm guidance is to ask for both the certificate of insurance and the bond certification, and to verify both with the companies named. Where a jurisdiction requires a bond, this is also how you find out whether they hold one.

Local registration and permits

This metro is dozens of incorporated cities plus very large unincorporated areas, and a great deal of mail addressed Houston is not in the city of Houston. Ask which jurisdiction your house is in, whether a permit is required for the work, and who is pulling it. A contractor who does not know which authority your address falls under is telling you something.

The windstorm inspection, on the coast

If your address is in the designated catastrophe area, TDI tells homeowners to ask the contractor specifically how they will meet the inspection requirement and obtain the certificate of compliance. Unfamiliarity with the windstorm inspection program is, on the coast, close to disqualifying. See windstorm cover and TWIA.

A physical address in the metro

Not a mailbox and not a truck. TDI’s advice is blunt about this: use local companies, verify the address and phone number, and be wary of contractors whose only references are out of town. A warranty from a company with no local presence is a warranty from a phone number.

Who is actually doing the work

Employed crews or subcontractors, either is legitimate, and you should know which. Ask who supervises, who is on site each day, and who you call when something is wrong.

A written scope

The document described in how to read a roofing estimate. It is the best single predictor of how the job will run, because a company that writes carefully generally works carefully.

References you choose

Ask for addresses of work in your area from the last year, and drive past a couple. Roofs are visible from the street, which makes this trade unusually easy to check.

What to ignore

• "Licensed roofer." There is no such Texas credential. If it appears in advertising, it either means something else or it means nothing.
• A discount that expires today. Roofing prices do not work that way. An offer that dies when the salesperson reaches the car is a pressure technique, nothing more.
• Badges and logos on a truck. Some are meaningful and some are memberships that cost a fee. Either way they say nothing about the crew that will be on your roof.
• A number of reviews. Review counts are the easiest thing in this industry to manufacture. Reading a handful of detailed ones is worth more than any total.
• "We work with all insurance companies." Everybody does. It is not a credential, and in Texas there is a limit to what a contractor is permitted to do with your insurance company at all.
• A brochure with a lifetime promise. Read what is actually warranted, by whom, for how long, and what voids it.

Post-storm canvassing, and how it works

After a significant hail or wind event, and especially after a landfalling system, crews arrive from out of state and canvass door to door. TDI puts it plainly: out-of-town scam artists may be the first to arrive at your front door after a disaster. The model is volume — sign as many insurance-funded jobs as possible in a few weeks, subcontract the work, and move to the next market.

Some of these operations do acceptable work. The structural problem is that nobody is here in year three when a flashing detail leaks, and a workmanship warranty is only worth the presence of the company behind it. The other problem is the incentive: a canvasser paid per signed job has every reason to find damage. So the useful response to "you have storm damage" at your door is a question — which recorded event, on what date — and Storm Check will tell you what NOAA actually logged near your ZIP code.

Four sentences that should end the conversation

1. "We can take care of your deductible." In Texas this is a criminal offense on their side — paying, waiving, absorbing, rebating or otherwise helping you avoid your deductible on insurance-funded work is a Class B misdemeanor — and a misrepresented claim with your signature on it on yours. Your carrier can demand proof you paid it before releasing the rest of the money. TDI’s instruction is to hire a different contractor.
2. "Sign here and we will handle the insurance company for you." Texas law prohibits a contractor from acting as a public insurance adjuster, or advertising to adjust claims, on a property it is providing or may provide contracting services for — regardless of whether it holds an adjuster license or a power of attorney. A contractor can document, photograph and write a scope. It cannot be your adjuster.
3. "Just sign that you agree to the repairs for the value of the insurance proceeds." TDI names this language specifically. Sign it and the contractor gets every penny of the settlement, whatever the work turns out to involve.
4. "This price is only good today." See above.

Payment, and one Texas rule about it

• Never pay in full up front, and be wary of a large down payment. When a disaster has been declared, it is against the law for contractors from outside your area to ask for payment before they start work.
• Pay by check or card, not cash. It creates a record. TDI advises exactly this.
• Hold the final payment until the work is finished — and on the coast, until the windstorm certificate of compliance has been issued for the work performed.
• Keep the proof you paid your deductible. You will need it to release the withheld depreciation on a replacement cost claim.

Questions worth asking, in order

1. Can you send me a certificate of insurance and a bond certification directly from your agent?
2. Which jurisdiction is my address in, is a permit required, and are you pulling it?
3. Is my address in the designated catastrophe area, and if so how are you handling the windstorm inspection and certificate?
4. How many squares is my roof, and how did you measure it?
5. How many layers are coming off?
6. What happens if the deck is bad, and at what rate?
7. Is all the flashing new?
8. What is your workmanship warranty, in years, and does it transfer if I sell?
9. Whose crew is doing the work, and who is on site supervising?
10. What is the payment schedule, and what is due before material arrives?

What good looks like

• They got on the roof, or explained precisely why they could not and what they did instead.
• They showed you photographs of your own roof, and pointed at specific slopes.
• They told you something did not need doing.
• The written scope names quantities, products and details rather than "install new roof".
• They knew which authority your address falls under without having to check.
• They were willing to leave and let you think about it.

That last one is the tell. A roofing decision made in a driveway under time pressure is the one people regret; a roofing decision made a week later with two scopes on the kitchen table almost never is.