Weird thing about roof material price quotes:

I did my own roof, and learned a strange thing about getting price quotes.

When I would call the roofing supply store and gave myself up as a do-it yourselfer(by my lack of knowledge on subject) , they seemed to add about 30% to the materials quote.

I learned this by accident, as I called the store, and described, using general terms what I was looking for, and got a price quote. They gave me item number, etc. When I called back a couple of days later, I was in a hurry, and must have sounded like a contractor ("need 14 square of GAF shingle item #XXXXXX delivered rooftop to house at location") and he gave me the price that was about 30% less. From then on, for all materials for the rest of the job called the roof store (of the same owner) farther from my house, talked to the guy, got item numbers, etc. Then I would drive to the closer store, walk in in my roofing clothes, rattle off the item #'s and amounts, and they would give me a cheaper price.

It didn't seem all that fair to stiff the little guy, but it is their business and they can charge what they want. I was just glad I caught on, and used thier own unwritten rules to my advantage.

BTW, 3 layer tear-off, roof was 14 square, a couple of valleys, 2 story, read a lot before I started, got my brothers to help, took a week, saved probably 2 grand. Still look up with pride, had 2 winters of icedams, and it is holding strong. My proudest household achievement.

Reply to
Rotation Slim
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lets face it a Do it yourselfer is only gonna do one room in a lifetime, maybe two.. if you are in the business they you will be coming back pretty often if you get the right price.. the store only has a once in a lifetime chance of making any money off of you...

Reply to
jim

Wait a minute. If you did your own roof, you shouldn't have had any ice dams. Ice dams are from a poorly ventilated roof. Period. Heat gets in, can't get out quick enough, melts the snow from the underside, it dribbles down to the point where it can refreeze, and becomes an ice dam. And ridge vents are not the best answer in areas that get a really big snow load.

Reply to
Michael Baugh

That's not always true... I've seen ice dams on southeastern valley exposures. The sun heats up the roof in the morning, starts melt, then due local conditions (trees, orientation), the roof goes back to shade and cool and freezes back up. Some pretty nice dams can build up as the weather adds new snow to the roof.

Reply to
3D Peruna

- Rotation Slim -

- Nehmo - I use the same technique. When I take a plane, I dress in a pilot's uniform. When I go to the emergency room, I wear a white lab coat and a stethoscope. If I have to go to court, I use a black robe. Works every time, but I'm wondering: how do you dress when you're shopping for a hooker?

- Rotation Slim -

- Nehmo - To complete the act you should have tired to get them to front you the materials until after the "customer" pays you. You could've offered them a posted-dated check perhaps.

- Rotation Slim -

- Nehmo - I'm all for people doing things themselves. But I wouldn't advise someone to do the tear off theirselves. Fourteen squares three-layers won't kill you, but the focus of the job is more concentrated where it should be when laborers do the tear off.

And are you getting visible ice (not snow) on your roof?

Reply to
Nehmo Sergheyev

So per-sale profit should be determined by how many times you'll make that profit?!?!

What a lame-ass rationale that is.

Let me know when Wal-Mart and Home Depot start giving discounts based on what you've spent with them in the last year or two.

If a 25% discount is good enough for contractors then it's good enough for the homeowner doing his own work. Otherwise, the distributor should refuse to sell to anyone without a biz license instead of trying to play both sides of the street.

Reply to
Curmudgeon

Yes, I've seen that. But that effect is from a thaw-freeze cycle, with pretty much uniform conditions on the roof. Not what I see as an ice dam, in which ice forms from a refreeze condition as plenty more melted snow makes its way down the roof to encounter the dam.

Reply to
Michael Baugh

They do. Every business does. The person who buys in volume gets a discount over the person who does not. What stinks about this particular situation is that this roofing company has no idea if this person is a volume account or not. It's not like they asked for his account number or something.

Dimitri

Reply to
D. Gerasimatos

Arrgghh! You made me look up at my bulletin board and I just noticed that my Home Depot 10% contractor's discount coupon expired 3 days ago.

Reply to
BP

"but I'm wondering: how do you dress when you're shopping for a hooker?" Like a married, middle aged, cubicle drone with kids, of course! You should lose the cowboy hat and snakeskin boots.

Reply to
BP

And your local auto repair shop gets a "discount" price when buying the parts they put on your car and the grocery pays less for milk they buy to sell to you. It is the way things work.

Their regular customers who know what they want and take a lot less of their time and often buy larger qualities get better prices. It makes sense. Other than the DIY places, most supplies of construction would rather not serve the general public.

Reply to
Joseph Meehan

Arrrgghh!! It should be a crime to put Home Depot, Lowes, and Contractor, together.

heh, Mark

Reply to
Mark & Shauna

I'm sorry that you didn't get the contractors discount until you lied. I don't suppose you'd like to tell me what is fair to charge by the hour, what percentage I can make on materials, AND how I'm going to pay my payroll, worker's comp, liability insurance, unemployment tax, social security tax, income tax, and save a few pennies to live are you?

Here is my opinion: You fit into one or both of these categories either now or during your life - Self-employed or worked for a company. If you were/are self-employed, you made too much money and are now bitching about someone else trying to earn a living. If you work/worked for another company, your companies owners charged too much because they were able to pay you a wage and make their living at the same time and now you're bitching about someone trying to do the same.....

- Robert

Reply to
American Mechanical

It's common practice to give building contractor's a price break on building materials. Usually they want you to *prove* you're a building contractor, but hey, sounds like you got lucky -- L.

Reply to
Lotte

- Joseph Meehan -

- Nehmo - Of course not all homeowners are jerks. But a homeowner is less likely to understand the ethics of buying from a supplier. Eg: One of the managers of the Home Depot in Merriam Kansas, told me HD was going to change its policy regarding the return of paint sprayers. He said too many homeowners were buying the machine only to return it after the job was done. (These people could have rented the machine, but they would have had to pay to do that.) The manager told me he's developed an intuitive sense about this. He said if he talks with the customer before the purchase, he can even predict if the customer will return a machine.

He said he doesn't have this problem with contractors because contractors need to keep the machine for the next job.

The conversation later led to him admitting it was unfair to charge homeowners and contractors the same price.

Reply to
Nehmo Sergheyev

Contractors are regular customers and DIYs are generally one time customers. A DIY has a ton of questions and needs a lot of handholding whereas contractors know what they want. Thus the difference in price. Makes sense if you think about it.

If you have ice dams you may need to increase the insulation in your attic. Snow on the roof may be melting from heat escaping from the house and refreezing once it hits the eaves. Adding insulation is usually the fix for this.

Reply to
Bruce

My first sales job was in a large discount store selling cameras. The lease company I worked for also had the sporting goods department. One day while filling in at the sporting goods department a customer came in to buy an expensive set of golf clubs. While I knew nothing about golf he knew what he wanted. He was also drunk as a skunk. I tried to discourage him, but he wanted them. I figured he really did not know what he wanted, he was just picking the most expensive and I really did not know enough to be sure.

After he left everyone said I should expect that they will be returned within 10 days. His wife would find out and send him back when he was sober. I guess he was not married and too embarrassed to return them, or maybe he liked them, but they never came back.

Reply to
Joseph Meehan

It doesn't particularly matter how the dam gets there - only that it does. We have an extremely well insulated roof; almost continuous soffit and ridge vents, gable vents, tons of attic insulation, etc.

And yet we ALWAYS get dams on the southern side of the house, and never once on the north, west, or eastern. Not much you can do about the sun, after all.

- Rich

Reply to
user

I have had them 2 winters in the last 6, both times I think it was unique weather that contributed to them, as both times EVERYONE in the area was having problems with them, the stores were all sold out of Ice Melter. I was happy that I had put 3 courses of Rubber ice shield, so I had protection up six feet up the roof instead of just 3.

When I did the roof I left the ventilation exactly as it was, actually improving it as I cleaned the birds nests out of the vents and replaced them. I did not however cut any new ones.

Reply to
Rotation Slim

Actually, at least in our area, contractors (the scumbags) are the worst ones for pulling this sh*t on the home centers. Roofing contractors in our area especially will get a bunch of jobs lined up and hire on a bunch of their drinkin buddies to knock the work out. They will go to the home center and buy a couple extra roof nailers, shoot the roofs, and then return the nailers when they get caught up.

You would always see TONS of recon. nailers there as the returned nailers, perfectly fine, would have to be sent out, reconditioned, and then sold for pennies on the dollar (for the manufacturer) with full warranty.

My philosophy is as long as the home centers can force the manufacturers into accepting, without question, ANY return it serves them right. I actually hope it continues at an escalated level as then the manufacturers will have no choice but to tell the home centers to screw themselves as the manufacturer cant absorb a 100% return policy as foolish as this.

These practices will either result in the tool market going to sh*t or the home center taking the hit themseleves rather than being able to pass it on to the manufacturer. As soon as the home centers have to bear the brunt of their own return policy it will end instantly or they will go out of buisiness.

Either way, while I dont do it, I say scam the crap out of the home centers and maybe we will be lucky enough to sink a few of them.

Mark

Nehmo Sergheyev wrote:

Reply to
Mark & Shauna

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