A New Roof = Full Steam Ahead

I was going to bust out a quick line of "The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire..." but thought it be best to spare you.

Our new roof was installed this week.

Materials were delivered to the site last Thursday. After we lost our outdoor furniture to some punks we thought it best to store everything out of sight. So, the shingles, flashing, etc. found a cozy spot in our garage.

The only catch to living in a super cool old house in the City (except for having to do the upkeep) is that your home more than likely falls in a Historic Preservation Zoning District. Meaning, you have to get approval for certain projects. Like a new roof.

We sent our paperwork in to the State (the City manages some, the State others) and went to our neat little meeting last Thursday afternoon with a sample in hand ready to receive our approval. A quorum was not present and therefore the meeting got rescheduled for a week later.

As a side note, we would never recommend an individual buy materials for a  project on a historic home that must receive approval from their local Historic Preservation Zoning Committee Board before actually gaining said approval. That being said, Paul previously worked in an administrative HP Zoning position at the City of OKC and reviewed certain elements of renovations/exterior changes and recommended approval or disapproval. While we had to appear before the State of Oklahoma's HP Board rather than the City's, we knew the selection we had made for our roof material was not going to raise an issue and actually took the sample necessary for review/approval from the materials delivered to us that morning.

We returned earlier today and received approval from the now present quorum with 2 minutes of starting the discussion on our house. Which was great.

Especially since we had the roof installed on Monday!

As a BIGGER side note, we would NEVER EVER, EVER recommend you have labor completed and paid for before receiving your zoning committee's approval. You could seriously be up a creek if they denied your request.

The crew arrived Monday morning and got to work immediately. We had them set up on their books for over a month and in Oklahoma, when you get a roofing crew you hold on to them for dear life. We we're not going to let our schedule fall any further behind because some committee members decided to shirk the responsibility they had signed up for. We could wait a week for approval, but we couldn't wait a week for the roof. Too many other items depended on it's speedy installation.

We have a very tall eave height (like 28 feet) and a relatively moderate pitch. I do not envy our roofers for the job they had to undertake.

Before

After

We decided not to re-roof the garage. For one, it was in better shape than the house. And our funding didn't allow for extra cash to be flying towards the garage at this time. So while the roof on our garage and the roof on our house won't match for the time being we know that chances of an Oklahoma hail storm coming through are rather large and it's replacement necessary. We also will one day put some money into that garage and a new roof can go on at that time if a hail storm doesn't happen first.

One last side note: One of our very good friends is involved in the roofing industry so if you are in Oklahoma City and need a new roof, we have a really great and legitimate (it's sad that I even have to add that caveat) company to recommend.

OCTOBER 22 2012 NOTE: WE'VE TURNED OFF COMMENTS ON THIS POST. ALL 11 COMMENTS THUS FAR HAVE BEEN SPAM "INTERNET MARKETING" COMMENTS FROM ROOFING CONTRACTORS AND SALESMEN FROM ACROSS THE COUNTRY. WE DON'T GET IT, BUT YOU'VE OFFICIALLY ANNOYED US. SO IF YOU ARE HERE LOOKING TO LOG YOUR NECESSARY MARKETING HOURS, YOUR BARKING UP THE WRONG TREE.