There is no single kind of roofing contractor work in Saratoga Springs. A Victorian on Union Avenue and a house in Geyser Crest have almost nothing in common beyond the weather they sit under. The city also reviews exterior work in its historic districts, which makes the order you do things in matter as much as the work itself.

Victorians, ranches and everything between

Saratoga Springs has more roofing variety per square mile than anywhere else we work.

Union Avenue, North Broadway and the East Side carry substantial Victorian houses with steep pitches, turrets, dormers, porches and a great deal of flashing. These are slow, detailed roofs where the flashing work matters more than the covering.

Then there is Geyser Crest and the newer development toward Saratoga Lake, Wilton and Malta, which is conventional suburban roofing on straightforward houses.

Downtown and along Broadway there is commercial and mixed-use property with flat and low-slope roofs behind parapets.

What we do most in Saratoga Springs

• Complex replacements and repairs on Victorian homes with steep, cut-up rooflines
• Flashing work at dormers, turrets, porch roofs and chimneys
• Conventional replacements in Geyser Crest, Wilton and Malta
• Flat and low-slope roofs on downtown and Broadway buildings
• Ice dam repairs, which the deeper eaves and complex valleys here make common

Historic district review

If your house sits in one of the city’s historic districts, exterior work can fall under design review. Roofing material and anything that changes the visible appearance is the kind of thing that gets looked at.

This is worth checking early rather than late. Establishing what is acceptable before you order material costs nothing. Finding out afterwards that a material or colour will not be approved is expensive and slow.

We will tell you what we know, but the city is the authority, and it is worth a call to them before you commit.

Complex rooflines and where they leak

A Victorian roof leaks at its junctions, not in the middle of a slope.

Every dormer cheek, every valley where two planes meet, every point where a porch roof abuts a wall, and every chimney is a place where two surfaces have to be made watertight by flashing rather than by the covering itself. On a house with a dozen such junctions, the roof is only as good as the metalwork.

That is why these jobs take longer and cost more than the square footage suggests, and why a quote that treats a Victorian as a simple area calculation usually turns into a change order later.

Around Saratoga and Malta

We cover the East Side, West Side, downtown and Broadway, Union Avenue, Geyser Crest, the Saratoga Lake area, Wilton and Malta.

One practical note: between July and Labor Day the track season changes traffic and access considerably. We schedule around it where we can, and it is worth factoring in if you are planning work for mid-summer.

Scheduling around the season

Work here is easier to plan outside the summer. Access, parking and traffic all change through the racing season, and on the streets nearest the track that affects how a job runs. We would rather tell you that at the quoting stage than discover it on the first morning.

Neighborhoods we cover

• East Side
• West Side
• Downtown and Broadway
• Union Avenue
• Geyser Crest
• Saratoga Lake
• Wilton
• Malta