Roofing in Ocean Ridge

Ocean Ridge is a few blocks wide and the Boynton Inlet runs through its north end, so salt spray reaches every roof in town from the ocean, the Inlet and the Intracoastal. Whatever the roof surface, the metal beneath and around it fails first: valley flashing, drip edge, hip and ridge fasteners under tile; clips, screws and cut edges under standing seam; chimney and wall flashings everywhere.

A roof at Inlet Cay or Place Au Soliel can look immaculate from the road while its fasteners have rusted to lace. Every job we do in Ocean Ridge specifies stainless or copper fasteners and flashing and sealed edge metal as the standard, and every inspection starts by probing that metal rather than admiring the surface.

The Town of Ocean Ridge reviews roofing for how it looks as well as how it performs, and on the estate streets and at the Yacht Club the profile, color and cap treatment of a tile roof are noticed. We prepare the town submittal with samples and photographs, salvage sound original tile for the hips and ridges where it shows most, and blend new tile through the field so the roof looks settled from the day it is finished.

Communities such as the Ocean Ridge Yacht Club and Pelican Cove add their own architectural standards, and those go into the proposal too. The written schedule includes the review time, so the finish date is one the town's calendar allows.

An Ocean Ridge repair usually begins with a brown streak below a ridge or a valley, and ends with rusted metal on the ground. The roofer cuts out the galvanized valley liner and replaces it in stainless or copper, strips flaking drip edge along the full eave and renews it, pulls corroded ridge and hip nails and resets the caps on stainless screws, and lifts, saves and relays the tile so nothing shows from A1A.

On a standing-seam roof it is rusted screws swapped for stainless, cut edges hemmed and sealed, boots and caps renewed. Flat roofs over garages and loggias leak at seams and scuppers and are repaired with the membrane's own system and stainless edge metal.

The stain indoors is rarely below the hole, so the water is traced from the roof and the attic, photographed, and priced in writing before work starts. A secured tarp comes first after a storm.

1. Past repair, an Ocean Ridge roof is rebuilt in tile or standing seam with the salt in mind from the first fastener. Tile goes on over new self-adhered underlayment and stainless or copper valleys, on stainless fasteners, with soft plywood and salt-eaten fascia replaced first and caps set on stainless screws.
2. Standing seam is aluminum on stainless concealed clips, hemmed and sealed at every edge, flashed in the same metal, because coated steel does not survive an inlet. The Town of Ocean Ridge inspects the dry-in and the finish.
3. Tile and metal both sit at the top rung of what a full roof costs in Palm Beach County, and stainless or copper throughout puts an Ocean Ridge roof at the top of that rung. The itemized scope shows every line; financing options are explained at the inspection.

Molsbee Roofing is a family business since 1975, licensed CCC1327429, based in Lake Worth Beach and working Palm Beach County, Jupiter to Boca Raton; Ocean Ridge is a short drive down A1A or over the Boynton bridge for us. We know what the Inlet does to a fastener, what the Town expects on a submittal, and we are still here next season when the roof needs looking at again.

Every job is permitted and inspected. Every price is itemized and in writing before work starts.

Free roof inspections for homeowners and for the associations at the Yacht Club and along the water. Call 561-318-8624, phone answered 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Ocean Ridge is a low-density barrier island town founded in the 1930s, with the ocean on one side and the Intracoastal on the other and every parcel inside a flood hazard area. In Palm Beach County a shingle roof generally lasts 13 to 18 years, tile 15 to 20, metal 20 to 25, and a flat roof 15 to 20.

On this island those ranges are the outside of the envelope rather than the middle, because salt reaches the valley metal, the flashings and the fasteners long before it reaches the covering. The practical timing rule here is that you replace a roof when the metal under it has gone, not when the tile looks tired, and the only way to know which you have is to lift the covering at a few points and look.

One more local consequence of the flood designation: because small work is permitted here rather than exempt, an island roof tends to have a paper trail, and that trail is worth reading before you decide between another repair and a replacement.