After a Storm, the Useful
First Step Is Knowing
A post-storm inspection tells you what actually happened up there — documented with photographs and a written summary you can act on, whatever you decide to do next.
From the morning after to handover
Drag the seam across the photograph — or focus it and use your arrow keys — to move between the roof we walked onto and the roof we handed back.
The morning after: shingles gone in sheets, decking open to the sky and the next rain already in the forecast.
Documented, dried in, and rebuilt — from emergency cover to a finished roof, with photographs at every stage.
What you can check safely, without leaving the ground
Do this once the weather has genuinely passed and it is safe to be outside. Take photographs of anything you find — they are more useful than a description later.
Walk the perimeter and look down first
Pieces of your roof on the ground tell you something before you look up. Shingle fragments, broken tile, sections of trim or flashing, granule accumulation washed out of the downspouts, or bits of gutter. Note roughly where each piece was — it points at which elevation took the hit.
Look at the roof edges and lines
The edges are where wind gets a grip. Look along the ridge, the hips, the rakes and the eaves for anything lifted, bent, out of line or missing. On metal roofs, look specifically at ridge and rake trim. On tile, at the ridge and hip caps.
Scan the field for gaps and displacement
Missing shingles, tiles sitting lower than their neighbours, panels that have lifted, or an area where the pattern is visibly interrupted. Binoculars or a phone camera zoom will show you more than your eyes will, and neither requires a ladder.
Check the gutters and downspouts
Sagging runs, sections pulled away from the fascia, dented or detached downspouts, and outlets packed with debris. Blocked drainage after a storm causes leaks in the weeks that follow, which then get blamed on the storm damage rather than the blockage.
Look for debris still on the roof
Branches, palm fronds or anything blown up there. Even where it has not punctured the covering, debris sitting in a valley dams water and will cause a problem in the next rain. Note it; do not go and get it.
Then go inside and look up
Ceilings in every room, particularly in corners, along exterior walls and around any ceiling penetration. Then the attic if you have safe access — daylight, damp sheathing, wet insulation or staining you have not seen before.
Four kinds of damage, with different signatures
They often occur together, and they need to be distinguished because they behave differently over time.
Wind-driven rain
Rain arriving horizontally is forced up under coverings that were designed to shed water running downhill. It gets past the surface and onto the underlayment, and finds any weakness there.
The signature: a roof that only leaks when it rains hard and the wind is from a particular direction. This one is easy to dismiss because the roof looks undamaged.
Missing or shifted material
Wind lifts and removes shingles, tiles, panels and trim. It also breaks the adhesive seal between shingle courses without moving them — the damage that matters most and shows least.
The signature: visible gaps, tiles out of line, or nothing visible at all while the roof's wind resistance has quietly dropped.
Debris impact
Branches, fronds and windborne objects strike the roof. Impact can crack tile, bruise or puncture shingles, dent panels, and damage vents, boots and skylights.
The signature: localised marks in a pattern, often on the elevation facing whichever tree or structure supplied the debris.
Flashing and gutter damage
Flashing lifted at a wall or chimney, gutters pulled loose or bent, downspouts detached. Easy to overlook because none of it is the roof covering itself.
The signature: gutters visibly out of line, and leaks appearing near walls and chimneys in the weeks afterwards.
Interior signs that follow a storm
Some appear the same day. Others take a fortnight and a second rain event before they show, which is why "nothing happened" is worth revisiting.
New ceiling stains
Rings or discolouration that were not there before. Photograph them while wet — they fade and become harder to evidence.
Bubbling or peeling paint
On ceilings or the upper part of walls. Moisture is behind the surface, and paint tells you before a stain does.
Daylight visible in the attic
Any light through the deck is a hole. This is one of the clearest findings there is.
Damp or compressed insulation
Wet insulation stops working and stays wet. It also marks the path water took to get there.
A musty smell that was not there before
Particularly in a closed room or a cupboard against an exterior wall. Often the first symptom of a slow leak.
Doors or windows sticking
Can indicate moisture in the structure around the opening. Worth mentioning at an inspection.
Water marks around ceiling fittings
Fans, downlights and vents give water somewhere to come through, so staining collects around them first.
A ceiling that is sagging or bulging
Water is pooling above it. Keep people away from underneath and treat it as urgent.
Do not go up there to look
It is the most understandable instinct after a storm and the one most likely to make things worse. Every year people are seriously injured checking their own roofs after weather events.
- The surface is compromised in ways you cannot see. A shingle whose seal has broken, or a tile with a hairline crack, will not hold your weight the way you expect.
- It stays slippery long after it stops raining. Wet algae, debris and residual moisture on a slope you are unfamiliar with.
- Storm debris hides hazards. Branches conceal damaged areas, and dislodged material shifts underfoot.
- Power lines may be down. Not always visibly, and not always where you would expect them.
- You will cause damage. Foot traffic on tile is one of the most common causes of cracked tile we find — sometimes the only real damage on a roof that came through the storm intact.
Everything genuinely useful can be observed from the ground, from an upper window or with a camera zoom. The rest is what an inspection is for.
If there is immediate danger
Downed power lines, structural collapse, a ceiling at risk of coming down, standing water near electrical fittings, or the smell of gas — contact the appropriate emergency service or your utility provider first. A roofing contractor is not the right call in those situations.
Once the property is safe, an inspection is the next step.
What a storm damage inspection produces
The point is evidence. Whatever you go on to do — repair, replace, claim or file it away — you need a clear record of the condition of the roof.
Your own record
Anything you photographed — debris on the ground, interior stains, damaged gutters — is worth keeping. Dates matter, and your photographs from the day of the storm are evidence nobody can recreate later.
Full roof inspection
The covering across every plane, all flashings, ridges, hips, valleys, penetrations, edge metal, gutters and downspouts. Damage is identified by location so it can be described precisely rather than generally.
Attic and ceilings where accessible
Water intrusion is confirmed from below as well as above where access allows. A stain inside and an entry point outside, connected, is a far stronger record than either on its own.
Photographs and written findings
Photographs of each area of damage, and a written summary describing what was found and where. Plain language, not roofing shorthand, so it is usable by you and by anyone you show it to.
An itemised scope
What we would do, broken down so each item is visible. Whether you proceed, get other quotes or submit it to your insurer is entirely your decision.
Being precise about our role
A lot of roofing marketing is vague here in ways that benefit the roofer. This is what we do and do not do.
What we do
Inspect the roof. Photograph what we find. Provide a written summary of the damage and its location. Provide an itemised scope and estimate for repair or replacement work. Answer factual questions about the roof and what caused a particular failure.
What we do not do
We are not a public adjuster, an insurance company, an attorney or your legal representative. We do not file, manage, negotiate or advocate in claims, and we cannot advise you on your policy, your coverage or what your insurer should pay.
Whether damage to your roof is covered is determined by your policy and your insurer. Nothing on this page is a statement about your coverage, and no inspection we carry out obliges an insurer to do anything.
Adjusting insurance claims in Florida is a licensed activity. If you want somebody to represent you in a claim, that is a licensed public adjuster or an attorney — a roofing contractor is neither, whatever some of them may imply.
Be careful about signing documents that assign your claim benefits to a contractor, and be careful about agreements that make work contingent on an insurance outcome. Read them, take them away, and get advice if you are unsure.
We will provide the documentation from our inspection to you. What you do with it is yours to decide.
What people ask after a storm
Often, yes. Wind damage frequently breaks the seal between shingle courses without moving them visibly, lifts flashing without displacing it, and loosens fasteners you cannot see from below. The roof looks intact and its resistance to the next storm has been reduced. Inspection after a significant wind event is worth it precisely because the ground view is unreliable.
Sooner is better, for two reasons. Damage that is left open lets water into the deck and insulation with every subsequent rain, and documentation is most useful while the evidence is fresh and clearly attributable to the event. If you may make an insurance claim, check your policy for any notification deadline — those are set by your insurer, not by us.
No. We are a roofing contractor. We inspect the roof, document what we find with photographs, and provide a written summary and a scope for any work. You or your insurer's representative use that as evidence. We are not a public adjuster, not a legal representative and not an advocate in your claim, and we will not represent ourselves as any of those.
Read whatever is put in front of you very carefully, particularly anything that assigns your claim benefits to a contractor or commits you to work contingent on an insurance outcome. After a major storm, door-to-door offers increase sharply and not all of them are what they appear. Taking a document away to read is always reasonable, and anyone who objects to that has told you something useful.
Temporary measures to limit water intrusion can form part of the response, and what is possible depends on the roof, the extent of the damage and the conditions on the day. It is something to discuss when you contact us rather than something we can promise generically on a web page.
Yes. Same inspection, same photographs, same written summary, no obligation. If the roof came through fine, that is what the summary will say — and that is a useful thing to have on file too.
Find out what the storm actually did
We will inspect the roof, photograph anything we find and give you a written summary of the damage and where it is. No obligation, and no claim to be anything other than the roofing contractor who looked at it.
Nice Roofing is a roofing contractor, not a public adjuster or an insurance representative.