Christmas is just around the corner and if you are like us, that means decorating your home with Christmas lights. There is nothing that says Christmas spirit than a home with eye catching lights. But one of the things we wanted to talk about is to make sure your light hanging skills aren’t affecting your roof. If you are in a hurry to quickly get the lights up, just make sure not to put any holes in your shingles. You certainly don't want to pull a Clark Griswold and staple your lights to your shingles. We always wince every year we watch that movie on that one. Lol.
A simple little hole in your shingle, even one from a staple gun can leave behind a way for water to make its way through the hole and eventually cause rotten roof decking. There are other alternatives when it comes to decorating your home with lights so that your roof isn’t damaged in the process.
- Safety is always first in any home project so make sure you plan ahead when hanging your decorations so you can have plenty of help. To increase the lifespan of your roof, you should limit the amount of walking on your rooftop and certainly avoid leaning the ladder against your gutter as that can warp them, dislodge them or even break them. Certainly don't go hanging from your gutter like Clark did. Lol
- If you are attaching to your gutter, use clips. You can avoid the fear of having roof damage by hanging lights from clips. These clips usually attach to the over the lip of the gutter. If you have a shingled roof, you should never hang the lights directly from the shingles, you should tuck the clip under the shingle. They also make magnetic clips for metal roofs.
- Once the Christmas season is over, we all tend to be anxious to clean up the decorations and put them away until next year. You may think that since you’re using clips, you can just yank them off to avoid wasting time taking them off one by one. Do not do that! If your clip is attached to the gutter and you start pulling the lights off, this could bend or ever tear off your gutter system. You don’t want to do that if it can be avoided.
If during the course of your light hanging you run into an emergency, North East Roofing is here for any emergency you may have. If you think you may have roof damage or you accidentally pulled, or damaged your gutter system, just give us a jingle and we'll be out there ASAP to quickly fix any issues. Happy Holidays from North East Roofing.