My reRoofing Project

Having put off "calling a roofer" to reShingle our 30-year-old roof for "a decade" — mostly because of the $10k estimate we got for that two years back… this Fall I decided to do it myself — as you see in the picture to the right which I got my buddy to take just in case no one believed me. It was a long job — much harder work than I had imagined, and it took me a lot longer (204 hours) than I had anticipated. But the good news is that I didn't do it alone (see below), and we had a really great six-week sequence of glorious New England Fall Days during which the weather was perfect for doing good hard work outdoors. See this Flickr album (or SlideShow) for the photo documentation of the whole event — with beautiful Fall snapshots, the real reason I couldn't put off the reRoofing project any longer (rotten plywood), detailed pictures of exactly how to go about doing the many intricate steps (as I constantly called on my buddy, Rob Augart, who does this for a living in his own business Augart Construction, in Winchester MA), the aftermath of taking saunas on many of the days after all the hard work was done, how I took on reShingling the roof of Lady's dog house to match, and finally Lady helping me fold the tarps cause it was so windy.

What is not so obvious in the pictures is the real reason for me taking on the job myself — that my total cost was about $3500, including that I paid the 3 men who helped me for the 133 hours of work that they put in, mostly working with me. Very much to my surprise… relative to the $10k estimate, it was like I paid myself around $30/hour for the work that I put in. Of course, none of this would have been possible if I had a real job !

On the left is my main man, Eugene (Butch) LeDonne, who will proudly tell you that he did all of the heavy lifting even though the truth is that I did my share too. And on the right is Serge, my Roosky comrade, who was hired as a roofer ostensibly because of his outstanding height… but really it was because I did indeed have an ulterior motive — it wasn't entirely out of generosity or need.

When all was said and done, I realized that this job was a really great way for me to spend time with my men, enjoying the great outdoors, getting good exercise, and feeling the satisfaction of a job well done at the end of each day.