Hurricane Season Prep for Your Roof and Windows: The Honest Checklist

Hurricane season runs June through November, and the honest truth about preparation is that almost all of it happens on calm, sunny days. By the time a storm has a name, your options have already narrowed. Here's the checklist we'd give a neighbor: no fear-selling, just the things that actually change outcomes for a South Florida roof and its openings.

• Walk your roof from the ground with binoculars or a phone zoom: lifted or missing shingles, cracked or slipped tiles, rusted flashings, debris in valleys. Don't climb: that's what pros with harnesses are for.
• Photograph the roof and every facade, dated. If a storm damages your home, 'before' photos are the quiet hero of a clean insurance claim.
• Pull together your roof's paper trail: replacement/repair permits, wind-mitigation inspection form, product approvals. Ten minutes of filing now saves weeks later.
• Clear gutters and roof drains: most 'storm leaks' are really ponding water finding an old weakness.
• Trim branches overhanging the roof. In wind, the tree you love is the debris the code warns about.
• If you have shutters: test-fit them NOW. Find the wing nuts, count the panels, run the accordions end to end. Seized tracks and missing hardware are August's most preventable emergency.
• If a repair is pending (a lifted edge, a small leak), do it before the season peaks. Small failures are what wind tears open.

• Deploy shutters early, in daylight, with help, not in the outer bands. (Impact-glass homes: this is the step you get to skip.)
• Clear the yard: furniture, potted plants, toys, anything the wind can throw at your own openings.
• Brace or verify the garage door: it's the largest opening in the envelope, and its failure pressurizes the house.
• Do NOT tarp, climb or 'quick-fix' the roof with wind approaching. No repair is worth a fall, and wet work fails anyway.
• Take one more dated photo set. Then close up and ride it out safely.

• From the ground, photograph everything before touching anything: missing shingle, displaced tile, debris impacts, every ceiling stain indoors.
• Mitigate reasonably (a bucket, moving furniture) but leave the roof to professionals; insurers expect mitigation, not amateur roofing.
• Call your insurer per your policy, and get a licensed local contractor's written assessment with photos.
• Know the law about door-knockers: under Florida Statute 489.147, a contractor may NOT offer you money, gift cards or deductible waivers in exchange for a roof inspection or an insurance claim. Waiving deductibles is insurance fraud. Anyone leading with those offers has told you who they are.
• Keep every receipt and every photo. Documentation is the difference between a claim that pays and a fight.