What goes around comes around….we hope

I love my job, I get to meet amazing people, and hear their stories when I arrive to check on roof problems. Recently I went to see a woman who wanted us to tear off her nearly new roof. She was holding full payment from her roofer who had successfully installed her previous roof. She lost confidence when the boss wasn’t there to supervise the workers and the result didn’t look right to her. The guy had returned to address some of the issues but the whole package appeared uneven to her and she was worried that it wouldn’t last.

Since it was so cold out we sat at the kitchen table, and she shared her stories while we waited for the sun to burn the frost off so I could inspect the project. A retired doctor, she had been one of only four women in her class at medical school. She had redesigned the remodel of her house producing an amazing space equal to the best work of a good architect. Over time she had more than her fair share of poor contractors, (which provided interesting horror stories), and yet she also managed to find some great ones.

We drank hot chai and I learned about her husband, a world class sitar player and the travels to India that they made. I was learning a lot, but I also got to share the history of shingle technology. Her previous roof material had been an organic product, and the new roof was made with fiberglass shingles which are very strong but much thinner. Fiberglass shingles also take longer to settle down on their new home, and until they do, the roof will sometimes have a bad hair day look. When they finally settle down, because they are so thin, any unevenness in the old roof deck will often show through.

With the roof warming up and the tea finished, we went up to see what was what with her roof.

Over 30 years I’ve seen a fair amount of really bad roofing but this roof was a bit of a shock. It was a great install, ruler straight lines, a good quality 30 year 3-tab fiberglass, plenty of high quality slant back vents, and really nicely done flashings at the chimney and pipes.

It takes time to build a quality roof, and it takes even longer to restore lost confidence with people. The happy result was that she doesn’t need another roof, and her roofer will get the rest of his money. Sometimes you just need to hear truth from a trusted third party. These days it is all too common for contractors to throw the competition under the bus, but at Lindholm we see it differently, the golden rule hasn’t fallen out of fashion yet. We still believe that what goes around comes around, here’s hoping if this happens to us, the guy they call has the same value system.

Created By John Norman