Roofing Contractors in Arlington, MA

East Arlington: two-families on tight lots

Cross Alewife Brook and the stock is the Somerville and Cambridge multifamily belt, with a town line through it. Hipped perimeters, a flat rear section over the back porch stack, plank sheathing laid with gaps. Most of it has been over-roofed already.

The rot sits in two spots. Behind the gutter return, where decades of overflow soaked the fascia. And along the low edge of the rear deck, where water stood against a lap seam. We handle those rear decks as a flat roof replacement rather than shingling them, because a torch-down patch never holds on framing with no pitch.

Slate in Jason Heights, Morningside and the Heights

West of Arlington Center the lots get bigger and the roofs get complicated. Queen Anne turrets, Craftsman gable returns, Tudor half-timber ends, and original slate that is often still sound. Under 780 CMR slate can never be roofed over. It comes off, every time.

Most slate calls here are not about the slate. Failed valley metal, a cracked chimney counterflashing, a dozen slipped tiles. Slate roof repair costs a fraction of a tear-off. On pitches of 8:12 and steeper the ice barrier must also run 36 inches up the slope, as our note on the Massachusetts ice and water shield rule explains.

The hill is half the job

Streets off Park Ave and around Turkey Hill sit on ledge. Driveways drop away from the foundation. We settle staging and dumpster placement at the estimate, not on tear-off morning.

Capes, finished attics and the February ice dam

Ice damming is our most common winter call here. The story-and-a-half Cape out toward the Heights puts finished bedrooms directly under the deck with almost no eave ventilation. The finished-attic colonials near Appleton Street do the same. Greater Boston sees about 92 days a year at or below 32 degrees but only about 23 that stay frozen all day. That gap builds the dam. We fix the cause with attic ventilation and insulation work, and we do ice dam removal with steam, never a hatchet.

Permits, historic review and snow load

Arlington pulls its own permits. Your reroof goes through the Arlington Building Department, and we file it with the liability certificate and workers comp affidavit. Design ground snow load here is 40 psf, verified from the 780 CMR Eighth Edition table.

If your house sits in a local historic district, review comes before material. The Arlington Historic Districts Commission covers the Pleasant Street, Broadway, Central Street and Jason/Russell districts, and the 1740 Jason Russell House anchors that last one. We build that timeline into the schedule.

Full roofs here land in a wide range depending on pitch, size, sheathing condition and whether slate is in scope. We put the number in writing after we walk it. We also cover Somerville roofing and roof repair in Cambridge.