Here is what I heard from the company that did the shingles roof of my house. Names have been changed or omitted to protect the innocent. ;) First Reply: Hi – It looks like they originally installed an EPDM rubber roof system up there and then applied a coating to it once it started to fail and cause leaks. I’m not sure on the leaks obviously, but most people would not spend $4-5 a SQ FT to apply a temporary solution for no reason whatsoever. It also appears to have been applied during the summer which is why you’re seeing bubbling in certain locations. Even though you’re not experiencing leaks, you can see on some of the zoomed in photos that some of the fiber from the rubber membrane is exposed due to aging. That’s obviously not a good thing. How much life remaining is almost impossible to narrow down since most people are pro-active and try to fix a problem before it becomes one and other people wait until they have interior damages to repair before doing anything about the source of the leak. I can’t speak for you there. Moving forward, we would recommend a TPO system (Thermoplastic Polyolefin) that utilizes fuse welded seems and also has energy efficient properties. This is the same type of membrane that’s used on commercial roof systems and new modern homes without roof pitch. We’re a GAF certified Master Elite TPO installer so we’re well-qualified to tackle this for you if you decide to go that route. Let me know if you want us to have someone out and get you a quote for that. Hope this helps. Thanks! I then asked him what it would cost, whether a low-slope roof is better, whether a shingles roof could be put in instead, etc. Second Reply: It’s better because there are essentially no penetrations for roof to get into even with product failure. Most shingles cannot be installed on a low-pitch roof and even so, they will typically have issues during heavy rain. We can usually instead a TPO system for $400-650 per 100 SQ FT depending on the area (large commercial projects will see the low end of that) and whether or not we’re adding insulation (PolyISO) board below the TPO as is common practice. I would of course get more than one quote from a low-slope roof specialist if I go that route. What do you guys think? Anyone familiar with the TPO System? Thanks in advance. (I still haven't gone up to measure the pitch. So, shingles may or may not be an option).

They had to remove the tile under the vinyl under the plank in my basement (if I had known the floor guys were installing the plank on top of a vinyl tile which was on top of tile I would have had them stop and remove the two layers that were there before they put the plank in!), the lower 24" of drywall, all the doors in the basement, the 3rd bathroom vanity, and the carpet in the family room area and 3rd bedroom/office/craft space when there was a pipe blockage - one small pair of child sized socks somehow managed to get flushed down the toilet in the kids' bathroom - that ended up sending water from elsewhere in the house (master bath/toilet/sink and kitchen sink water) up through the laundry standpipe in the laundry room which backs up to one of the walls down in our furnace room in such a quantity that the floor drain out of the house to the main sewer line couldn't handle it all and it wasn't 'clean' or 'gray' water. When the water heater suddenly turned into a geyser-like fountain we were able to shut it off pretty quickly and it was clean water so after mopping and wet-vacuuming plus a few days with dehumidifiers along with those giant noisy fans saved us the pain of having the newly installed drywall redone! The basement water damage we were able to file a homeowners claim on, one thing people should note is that they have the duty to mitigate the damages as soon as they notice a problem - if that means calling the remediation company first and THEN your insurer, that's how you need to do it. If you call about possibly making a claim, even if you don't end up doing so, it goes on your file because the insurer will be looking for ways to minimize how much they have to pay out on future claims. If you ask about water damage claims, but ultimately don't go forward on that claim, but down the road you have water damage from a different issue that might be difficult to get your insurer to pay out on too - they look for reasons to deny claims, they make much of their money paying out out less than they take in with premiums and deductibles. Mold is a non-covered issue (usually) if it's due to lack of maintenance or failure to address the issue at the time and where it started. They don't cover sewer main backups that originate outside of your home and the loss must be sudden and unexpected. How do I know all this? Well...The basement. :P I've probably driven the poor workers a bit mad with all the moisture readings I've asked them to take just to be sure (I know it's dry but the irrational part of me wants to be totally certainly 100% truly sure of it!) Now we're just waiting on the flooring to come in and once that's installed the whole project will be finished. At least we don't have problems with the windows down there (yet!) and they're above grade. There's good drainage away from the house outside, all we need to do is avoid further socks being flushed down the toilet! We're still not quite certain how that happened but at this point it's sort of moot and the damage done.

I have an odor that smells like: sweet organic odor (solvent odor) that seems to seep in through my vents - especially under the sinks in the Kitchen and bathroom and is quite sickening. It comes and goes - seems related to weather. It started when they were trying to repair the roof leak which is right above my apartment. They did some stuff - think they put some kind of (flashing)? cement down and waited from december until last week when they came back and put tar over it. I have had this horrible smell the whole time and now it seems more toxic and even stings my nose. The owners say "they can't smell it and it is coming from a Donut store- duh!!!. I need to know what is going on and how I can get rid of it. Called the Air Quality control people and they said it sounds like a roof thing but would charge me $2500 to come and check it out....it isn't my building and I am a Senior and not this kind of money.

I also had a leak originating from failed sealant around the plumbing stack. The water ran down the outside of the pipe, and actually showed up on the wall 2 floors below (the pipe ran through the exterior wall, below the attic). I have also experienced that water from a roof leak can track along the rafter or floor joist for some distance before it finds its final path downward - either by finally dripping, or by hitting a stud or wiring or something else, and tracking down that. It depends on the shape and construction of your roof, and also if there is a slope to your ceiling/floor joist. So it was that a leak that originated along the gutter showed up in the center of the room, dripping through the light fixture. My most recent leak occurred after a new roof, gutters and siding went on the house after a tree fell on it. I started seeing water dripping from the bottom of the circuit breaker box onto the basement floor - when I followed the track, it wasn't coming from where the electric entered the house (as I expected), but was entering somewhere above and tracking down the external wall until it hit the top of the foundation block. Fortunately I had a very good roofer to call (after the contractor responsible for the roof & siding ignored me); he actually found several suspect areas that should have been caulked but weren't, and a defect in the installation of one gutter in the same area. He didn't know exactly which was allowing the water in; he just fixed all of them and the leak has stopped. The bill? $230.