Is Roofing a DIY job – Labor and Heavy Lifting Considerations.

Roofing is heavy material, and the amount of lifting should not be discounted.  Even a basic 20-year 3-tab shingle weighs 225-lbs/square (a square is 100 square feet of roof).  A typical roof in my Kansas City roofing service area in Kansas City is 25-30 squares.  For 3-tab shingles, it takes 3 bundles/square, so each bundle is just shy of 80-lbs.  Most of my customers opt for architectural shingles, and these weigh more but you should always just plan on approximately 100-lbs/bundle.  If you like designer series asphalt roofing, we can easily exceed 450-lbs/square.  Let’s do some quick math; assuming a 30-square roof, you are easily moving 7,000-lbs. to 14,000-lbs. of just roofing shingles.  This doesn’t account for underlayment (60 lbs./roll for 30-lb. felt).

Rather than expound on the amount of labor is here, I am going to tell an amusing story about one of my neighbors (who shall remain nameless to protect the innocent).  A very accomplished DIY person who was convinced that roofing was within his skillset (a good assumption).  As a good DIY researcher, he researched options, made decision, and then went shopping for the cheapest delivered price.  His roof was a bit larger than typical, roughly 35-squares.  When this was delivered, his roofing materials was unloaded on a pallet and the pallet placed just in front of his garage door, which happened to be the center of a two-car garage opening.  Please note that this was roughly 105-bundles of roof shingles, I will leave the rest of the materials out of the weight calculations.

This was over 9,000-lbs of asphalt shingles.  So how did that roofing get from his driveway to the roof?  Over his shoulder, up a ladder, one bundle at a time.  Each bundle weighed 90-lbs.  He was up and down that ladder 105 times just to get asphalt shingles from where the store delivered them to a place he could use them.  All because he did his research and saved money be using the lowest delivered price.  How much was his time worth?  How much time did he have invested before he even opened a shingle pack and started nailing?  And once on the roof, he still had to distribute the packs to where he was installing them, so it wasn’t simply up and down the ladder carrying 90-lbs every time.

On the other hand, professional roofers pay extra for rooftop delivery.  Rooftop delivery takes special equipment, and these roofing suppliers generally serve professionals only.  My roofing supplier will sell to DIYs, but it is up to the DIY to find the suppliers that cater to professionals, and not DIYs.  And the cost for this service, to professionals that do repeat business?  Sure I can order ground-drop delivery, but rooftop delivery is generally only $10-20 dollars more, although I do have to accommodate their schedule as not every truck is equipped for this.

This is certainly a pitfall of DIY roofing that isn’t explained in any books.

---