Historic Home Renovation Ideas for Roof Restoration Projects

Historic Home Roof Restoration Ideas for Historic Home Renovation Projects

One of the most eye catching features of a lot of Historic Homes in the South Carolina area, and across the country, is the steep, detailed, and intricate roofing systems.  The steep pitched roof adds exterior beauty, as well as increased interior spaces.  Existing historic homes in most southern towns are generally large in square footage, and belonged to wealthy homeowners, who really put the money and time into building the homes.  The story that goes along with a historic home, is always interesting as well, so keeping with the same time era styles and building products is very important.  Many Historic Home Preservation Committee's are really strict on allowing changes, and its sometimes hard to find material matches that these Historic Home Preservation Committee's will approve.  This often adds more cost and burden to a historic homeowner trying to make home improvements, and often discourages potential historic homebuyers away from owning a Historic Home. 

One of the major cost in a lot of Historic Home Renovation projects is the roofing system, because of no A/C in the time frame the home was built, roofing systems such as tile, metal, and tin were used to help lower temperatures inside the home, during the hot summer months North Carolina and South Carolina are all accustomed to dealing with.  It has been proven now that thes historic roofing systems reduce utility bills for homeowners, by 10-20% in modern times.  Although added energy savings for historic homeowners, they're often left out of cheaper roofing alternatives then traditional homeowners, and left dealing with the headache of shopping for a roof tile, or metal roofing material, that is often hard to find in this part of the country; that the historic preservation committee board will approve for both style and color.  Another concern even after historic homeowners have been approved on building materials, its often hard to find a contractor that is experienced enough to perform the intricate cuts and details historic home roofing systems often have.  The good news is tho, with new technology, and more competition for building materials entering the historic home construction market. More and more historic homeowners are finding the historic home renovation project a little less challenging.

Retro-Solutions Construction Company of Myrtle Beach, SC is one of these companies experienced in historic home renovations, and offering historic home renovation solutions to Historic Homeowners in North and South Carolina.  Thru experiencing some of the challenges and suprises that often pop up during Historic Home Renovation projects, we have learned a few things that have helped historic homeowners save money on historic home renovation cost.  In this section we are going to talk about the Roof Restoration in particular, as it is one of the most important phases of any Historic Home Renovation projects, because a bad roof can destroy everything else that has been preserved inside the home.  The roof is also one of the more expensive phases of Historic Homeowners as well, and if your on a construction loan, most banks are going to require a satifactory roofing system, before releasing money for other phases of restoration.  With limited experienced roofers able to re-create the styles and techniques of earlier time eras, this can create problems for the construction project schedule, so its important to be able to find a roofing contractor that can help you right away.  When planning a Historic Roof Resoration project, its a good idea to keep these ideas in mind when picking a roofing contractor for your Historic Home Renovation project.  Here are some tips for picking a roofing contractor for a Historic Home Renovation Project.

1. Experience with Historic Home Renovation - Although there are many roofing contractors with roofing experience, it doesn't always mean that they have done historic roof renovation projects. An experienced historic roof restoration contract is going to be able to tell you problem areas, as well as available roofing materials that are going to pass Historic Home Preservation Committees often strict guidelines in materials used. Having roofing material options is always going to give a Historic homeowner a way to save money on renovation cost.  An experienced roofing contractor is also going to be able to check and inspect for structural damage, and offer affordable solutions for any structural roof repairs that may need to be made.
2. References - Although this may also fall under the category of roofing experience, its often good to still get references, so that you can physically go view other Historic Home Roof Restoration the roofing contractor has done.  Details are extremely important on Historic Roof Restorations, and you want to make sure your roofing contractor has the abilities to perform the work that the roofing company has proposed to do.
3. Trust  your Roofing Contractor - Once you have found an experienced roofing contractor that has been successful in other historic home renovation projects, its good to let the roofing contractor take control of the roofing portion of the project.  Not only is an experienced roofing contractor going to offer more material options, but there also going to get a better price on the roofing materials then the average historic homeowners.  Suppliers are more likely to give a price break to a roofing contractor who is going to be back the next week to purchase, then to the homeowner who may not need another roof for 30-100 years.  A roofing contractor is also going to know about technological improvements to underlayments and flashing techniques that can save on roofing cost and/or improve overall efficiency of your roofing systems.
4. Time Management - In addition to finding an experienced roofing contractor, your going to need a roofing contractor that is going to be able to meet your time schedule for construction.  Its important to have a roofing contractor experienced to know other trades are following, so a good question to ask your roofing contractor is how long will it take to complete, and also how long will it take go be dried in, so that you can coordinate with other construction trades that are dependent upon a dried-in roof to begin their phases of construction.
5. Helpfulness - Another quality you want to look for that is sometimes unmeasurable in price, is how helpful is your roofing contractor going to be, in helping gain historic preservation committee approval on roofing materials.  A roofing contractor experienced with historic home preservation will usually be able to streamline the approval process, and make it a lot less of a hassle for the historic homeowner. 

These are just a few tips we have used to help make Historic Home Preservation easier for Retro-Solutions Construction Company customers in North Carolina & South Carolina.  These few tips can also be applied to other trades as well.  With the many details in woodworking and metalworking on historic homes, its good to have a contractor in any trade experienced with more historic building techniques, because details really stick out in historic homes.  Craftsmanship is one of the most notable achievements from builders in historic times, so you also want to preserve this craftsmanship, in addition to the colors and building material styles as well.  There's a reason that home is still standing after 100 years, and that reason being the craftsmanship of early American builders.

Retro-Solutions Construction Company is here to help with all your Historic Home Restoration projects and we also offer Energy Saving Home Improvements for the historic homeowners as well.  We have tile matching, metal matching, slate matching, and cedar matching available for Historic Roof renovations that match time and style for most historic homes in North and South Carolina.  If your looking for a quality Historic Home Renovation in the Carolinas please give us a call at 706-951-0158.  Also be sure to check out our other blog post and website, http://www.scroofingcontractors.com/  for more information on Historic Home Renovations, as well as Energy Saving Home Improvements like spray foam insulation, solar energy, & other Energy Star & "Green" building materials that save on utility bills.  Stay tuned to our blogs for more post on historic home renovation projects.

Retro-Solutions Construction Company Myrtle Beach, SC 29577 706-951-0158 http://www.scroofingcontractors.com Energy Efficient Roofing Systems | Spray Foam Insulation | Wall Foam Insulation | Crawl Space Encapsulations | Solar Energy Powered Hot Water Heaters | Solar Energy | Energy Monitoring | Standing Seam Metal Roofs | Tile Roofs | Slate Roofs | Historic Home Retrofits |