Most people looking for a roofing contractor in Delmar have an older house, mature trees over it, and a roof that is on its second or third covering. That combination is specific enough to plan for. Architectural shingles have replaced the original three-tab on most of these houses, ice dams are a routine winter event, and Cape Cod and colonial rooflines both bring their own detail work.

Delmar colonials and the Bethlehem suburbs

Delmar proper is largely a product of the 1920s through the 1950s: centre-hall colonials, Capes and the occasional Dutch colonial, on tree-lined streets where the houses have mature roofs and mature trees over them.

Those two things interact. A roof under heavy tree cover stays damp longer, collects debris in the valleys and grows moss on the north slopes. It is not a reason to cut the trees down, but it does mean the roof needs looking at more often than one sitting in full sun.

Newer parts of the Town of Bethlehem, particularly Slingerlands and Glenmont, are a different picture. Those subdivisions are later and more uniform, and the work there is mostly first or second replacements on conventional roofs.

What we do most around Bethlehem

• Replacements on 1920s to 1950s colonials and Capes in Delmar and Elsmere
• Chimney flashing, which on houses of this age is often the original and well past it
• Decking repairs found during tear-off on older roofs
• Valley and debris-related repairs on roofs under heavy tree cover
• Newer subdivision replacements in Slingerlands and Glenmont
• Ventilation work, since many of these attics were never vented to modern standards

Chimneys on older Delmar houses

An older Delmar colonial usually has a masonry chimney, and the joint between that chimney and the roof is the single most common leak we find on houses of this era.

Proper chimney flashing is two parts: step flashing woven into the shingle courses, and counter-flashing let into the mortar joints above it. What we often find instead is a bead of sealant doing the whole job, applied at some point when someone wanted a fast fix. Sealant has a service life of a few years at best, and it fails quietly.

If the ceiling stain in your house is anywhere near the chimney, that is where we look first.

Trees, valleys and the north slope

Debris in a valley holds water, and water that sits finds a way under the covering eventually. Moss does something similar, lifting the shingle edges as it grows.

On Delmar streets with mature canopy, keeping valleys and gutters clear does more for the life of the roof than almost anything else. It is worth a look each autumn, covered under roof inspection and maintenance.

Across the Town of Bethlehem

We work throughout Delmar, Slingerlands, Glenmont, Elsmere, Selkirk and the surrounding parts of Bethlehem.

Ice dams on Bethlehem streets

Ice dams are routine here rather than exceptional. A Cape Cod with a finished upstairs has very little room at the eaves for insulation and an air path both, and that is exactly the condition that melts snow from underneath and refreezes it at the overhang. When we put architectural shingles on one of these houses we run ice and water shield well past the line of the exterior wall and check that the soffit intake is actually open, because a new covering alone will not stop it.

Neighborhoods we cover

• Delmar
• Slingerlands
• Glenmont
• Elsmere
• Selkirk
• Bethlehem