Did you know that, in America, there are over 32.5 million small businesses? If you’re a business owner with a commercial building, then you need regular roof maintenance.
Inspecting commercial roofs is an excellent way of ensuring your roof is in top-notch shape while identifying small issues before they become large ones. Not only does this save you money, but it protects your employees, customers, and tenants from hazardous roof leaks.
This article explains all the benefits of regular roof maintenance and why every business needs to add this essential service to their yearly maintenance checklist.
1. Extend the Life of Your Roof
When you invest in a roof maintenance routine for your commercial building, you’re extending the life of your current roof. It’s true that modern roofing materials can help your roof last anywhere from 10 to 40 years, but only with proper roof maintenance.
If you have a fixed roof maintenance budget, you may find yourself replacing your roof ahead of schedule if you fail to properly care for it.
Weather conditions also affect the lifespan of your roof, but routine maintenance checks can address any issues on the spot, working to undo signs of wear and tear and slowing down how quickly your roof deteriorates.
2. Prevent Damage
It’s best to inspect your roof every spring and fall, looking for minor issues. This allows you to repair them before they turn into a larger, more expensive repair.
A bitumen roof, for example, is prone to damage from tree branches, mechanical systems, and foot traffic. However, during a routine roof inspection, a roof technician can look for holes and punctures, patching them along the way. If seam defects are detected, they can correct them before a roof leak occurs during heavy rainfall.
Keep in mind that minor issues with your roof aren’t easily identified by the layperson. However, licensed and insured roofing companies can conduct a thorough roof inspection, looking for issues lurking beneath the surface.
3. Reduce Your Liability
When you let your roof maintenance fall by the wayside, your business is susceptible to roof leaks. This can leave unsightly water marks on your ceiling, something customers take note of.
But roof leaks are more than visually unappealing. If your roof drips onto the floor, you open yourself -and your business- up to liability lawsuits from slip and fall accidents. This can result in injury, and seeing as slip and fall accidents are the second most common form of injury, it’s best to protect workers and customs from them.
When slip and fall lawsuits arise, it can greatly affect your growing business and cause a potential spike in your insurance premium. Poorly maintained roofs are fiscally and physically a liability, so properly maintain yours to avoid the prospect of liability lawsuits.
4. Protect Employee Health
A leaking roof can lead to dangerous mold growth, affecting the safety of your employees and customers. However, when you hire an experienced technician to maintain your commercial roof, you’ll work to prevent leaks before they start. This keeps you and your employees safe.
5. Saves You Money
Commercial structures built in the 2000s have an average size of 19,000 feet. If you replaced a roof this size with sheet metal, for example, you could pay anywhere from $200,000 to $250,000, depending on the quality of materials you use.
Roof maintenance is a simple, inexpensive way to extend the life of your roof, saving you hundreds of thousands of dollars in costly roof replacements ahead of schedule.
6. Minimally Invasive
Although roof replacements are often a necessity, roof maintenance is less invasive than roof replacement. Your employees, customers, or tenants won’t know that anyone is on the roof and the vast majority of items on your roof maintenance checklist won’t pose a hardship to the operations of your building.
You can go about your day-to-day activities without the inconvenience of a complete roof replacement.
7. Green Maintenance
When you opt to maintain your roof, you’re going green and implementing environmentally friendly practices. You can repair issues to preserve the integrity of your roof, preventing old roofing materials from entering landfills should you need a complete tear-off. Seeing as 140 million tons of waste enters landfills annually, you’ll be working to prevent even more waste from accumulating.
8. Tax Deductions
Did you know that many roof maintenance programs are tax deductible? The IRS allows you to deduct any qualifying equipment as long as it’s the same tax year you purchased it in. This applies to commercial roofs and falls under the IRS’ Section 179 tax code.
What’s Included In a Maintenance Program?
For starters, your commercial roof should be inspected at least twice annually, once in the spring and once in the fall. However, you should have your roof inspected more often if you experience extreme weather patterns and conditions.
It’s essential to inspect your roof for structural damage caused by harsh weather. Roofs that experience extreme conditions should be inspected 6-12 times a year.
Your technician will inspect your roof visually, documenting its condition and taking photographs. They’ll identify your roof’s metal components, accessories, adjacent walls, penetrations, flashings, mechanical equipment, and anything else that may affect the integrity of your roof.
Invest in Regular Roof Maintenance Today
Regular roof maintenance is the best way to maintain the integrity of your roof. You’ll save money on costly repairs, protect your employees and customers from dangerous mold and mildew growth, and reduce your liabilities.
Contact Innovating Roofing for a free quote. We offer residential and commercial roofing and repairs and can help you with any roof-related issues.
