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Warning Signs of a Deteriorating Roof
Your home’s roof protects you, your family, and your entire house from nature’s elements. Like anything else, a roof requires regular care and maintenance in order to function properly and last as long as possible. Wear and tear is inevitable, and even the best constructed roof will wear out eventually.
How Often To Inspect
Roof damage can be minimized through regular interior and exterior inspections to detect any minor problems. Homeowners should complete a roof inspection at least two times a year — spring and fall. It also is a good idea to check your roof after a bad wind storm or an unusually harsh winter storm. High winds can damage shingles. Since some types of storm damage won’t show itself until the seasons change, regular inspections could reveal weather-related damage that wasn’t initially detected.
Taking the time to do a thorough inspection on a regular basis will save you a lot of money in the long run.
What To Look For
The best place to begin is inside your house in the attic. Using a flashlight, look for places where the roof deck is sagging. Check for any signs of water damage or leaks, and any outside light showing through the roof.
When inspecting the exterior roof, pay attention to any damaged flashing, missing shingles, and shingles that are curling, blistering, buckling, or rotting. Always inspect under eaves and overhangs to look for damage that might indicate water leakage, especially at points of the roof that don’t conform to the regular roof plane, such as dormers or skylights.
Here are eight warning signs that you may need a new roof:
Curling or Cupping Shingles
Curling is a common problem and is usually a result of improper shingle storage before installation, incorrect installation, excessively dry asphalt shingle bases, poor quality materials, or just natural wear. When shingles curl, they are no longer able to keep water from seeping through your roof, which could potentially cause serious structural damage.
Missing Shingles
Shingles only protect your roof if they are all intact. Missing shingles create convenient openings through which water can enter your home. Shingles can be pulled off your roof by strong winds or falling tree branches and can also be broken by repeated freezing and thawing. However, take special note if your shingles come off without any real reason – if this happens they are definitely worn out.
Decaying Shingles
All roofing materials will eventually deteriorate. Often, shingles on a roof will not all go bad at once. Decaying shingles are fairly easy to notice. Look for splitting, cracking, chipping, peeling, curling, or blistering, and replace the affected shingles as necessary.
Blistering Shingles
When moisture or gas builds up inside of a shingle, it can cause the surface to bubble outward, known as blistering. Conditions that cause blistering can include a poorly ventilated attic, leaf or debris buildup or just natural roof aging. 
Intense sunlight exposure also can cause worsen a blistering problem.
Damaged Flashing
Flashing is a layer of metal sheeting installed at an angle or joint in your roof which prevents water from breaching the roof. The most common place to find flashing is around your chimney or sewer vent pipe.
Rotting
If your roof is rotting, the problem should be fairly obvious and must be addressed immediately. If some shingles are rotting, the rest could follow soon. Rather than wasting time, energy and money replacing many individual shingles, you should bite the bullet and replace them all.
Age
No roof is going to last forever, and the biggest sign that it’s time to replace it is age. If your roof is more than 20 years old, it might be time to replace it.
A healthy roof on your house is important – it keeps both you and your home safe. Regular inspections to watch for signs of wear or damage will let you take immediate action to repair minor issues before they turn into major problems.