‘Tis the season(s) for holiday home decorating and we are just as excited as you are! Whichever holiday you’re decorating for this season, it’s important to protect your roof while you’re decorating. Lights and inflatables are really fun, and we whole-heartedly support all holiday home decorations, but we’re here to provide roofing education so we think it’s really important for home and business owners to know how to decorate for the holidays and prevent future roof leaks.

Holidays Home Decoration Installation

First things first, safety!

It’s important to take steps to make sure you’re decorating for the holidays as safely as possible. Don’t decorate alone, it helps with both saving time and ensuring holiday decoration safety. Having a friend hold the ladder for you, hand you a string of lights, and pass you the appropriate tools will really help you as you start to decorate your home for the holidays. If you’re frustrated because you’re going up and down the ladder by yourself, you’re more likely to rush through the decoration installation and you could cause serious roof damage – increasing your likelihood to need roof leak repairs later down the road.

Planning ahead will really help holiday decorating go by smoothly. If you’re needing to walk on the roof, choose a pair of shoes with a good grip and make sure your ladder is placed firmly on solid, level ground.

The Don’ts:

Don’t use staples – instead, use clips

Staples damage roofing materials and siding materials, creating small little holes that allow water intrusion to the material that you’ve stapled. Water damage degrades shingles, decking, and siding materials. If you’ve ever dealt with a roof leak before, you know that the smallest amount of water damage can be really costly – financially and to the overall health of your roofing system. Other items to avoid using as roof fasteners are nails and screws. Clips can be attached to your home gutter system and are easy to remove. It’s still important not to add too much weight to your clips to avoid damaging your gutters. One strand of lights per clip is, generally, ideal.

Using holiday inflatables? Weigh them down!

 Statues and figurines aren’t typically recommended to place onto your roofing surface. Their weight can cause damage to the shingles underneath them. However, don’t let a lightweight inflatable fool you – they can cause damage to your roof too! Anything over 40 degrees, placing inflatables is considered a safety hazard and they’d be best placed on the ground. Avoid placing holiday inflatables near chimneys and power lines for the obvious fire-hazard reasons. Be conscious of placing any statue or inflatable over roofing vents too.

Don’t get shocked

Strings of lights, spotlights, holiday inflatables – they usually require a power source. We recommend using a portable outdoor circuit. Be careful not to overload your breaker, which is a potential fire hazard.

Don’t rush

Putting a lot of time into safely installing home holiday decorations. Remember to put time into taking them down too. We receive so many calls over the holidays from homeowners who hastily ripped their lights down…but ended up taking a stretch of the gutter with them. Take the time to remove each of the decoration clips individually – trust us, it’ll be less time consuming than calling around for gutter repairs on New Years Day.

TekRoof is a Greater Boston residential roofing company. TekRoof will help you with your roof installation needs but also its maintenance. Among other Boston roofing services, we offer advice on how you can enhance your home’s curb appeal. Request a Free Quote Online or call 1-833-TEKROOF (833-835-7663).