Let's be straight about Jersey City first. A big share of the housing downtown, around Paulus Hook, Van Vorst Park and Hamilton Park, is brick brownstones and row houses with flat or nearly flat roofs behind a parapet. Those are membrane jobs, and they aren't our core work. What we do as roofers in Jersey City, NJ is pitched roofs: the one- and two-family frame houses that the city's own master plan describes as predominant in the Heights, Greenville and the West Side, plus the gutters that hang off them.
More than a third of the city's housing was built before 1940, so roof replacement on those houses usually means getting through several generations of roofing. The International Residential Code as enforced in New Jersey doesn't allow a new layer on a roof that already carries two, so the old layers come off, the boards get checked, and the eaves get ice-and-water shield before new shingles go down. Low-pitch rear sections need extra care, because shingles have limits on how flat a roof they can go on.
As in most of Hudson County, the hardest part of the job is often the street. Houses sit close together on small lots, side yards are a few feet wide or don't exist, and many older homes have no off-street parking, so the dumpster and material delivery get planned before anything else. Gutters deserve the same attention: an overflowing gutter on a house built against its neighbor sends water straight down the shared wall. If yours keep clogging, gutter guards are worth a look once the gutters themselves are sound.
Around Jersey City
We regularly work near:
- 📍Liberty State Park
- 📍Journal Square
- 📍Newport Centre
- 📍Paulus Hook Historic District
Roofing Company in Jersey City — Local Notes
- •Flat and low-slope roofs on downtown brownstones and row houses are membrane work, not shingles. Our focus in Jersey City is the pitched-roof frame houses and their gutters.
- •Replacing the roof covering on a detached one- or two-family house needs no construction permit. Row houses, other attached homes, buildings with three or more units, and structural work go through the city's Division of the Construction Code Official.
- •In Jersey City's historic districts, the Historic Preservation Commission reviews exterior work, including ordinary maintenance, whether or not a construction permit is required. Check before you change roofing materials.
- •Superstorm Sandy in 2012 flooded roughly 39% of the city's land and brought trees down well inland, including in the Heights. After any big wind event, look for lifted shingles and loose flashing.
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