What to Check After Hail or High Winds in San Antonio

A storm goes through, and the question everyone has is the same: did that do anything to my roof? It is a hard question to answer from the driveway, because the damage that matters is often the damage you cannot see from there.

Here is the order that actually helps.

1. Stay off the roof

This is first because it is the one that gets people hurt. A roof that has just taken hail or high winds can have lifted shingles, hidden soft spots, and debris on it. It is also frequently still wet. Whatever you would learn up there is not worth a fall, and a qualified person can find it more reliably anyway.

The same goes for ladders in the days after a storm. Look from the ground, from an upstairs window, or from inside the attic.

2. Look from the ground

Walk the perimeter of the house and look for:

• Shingles or pieces of shingle in the yard, in the gutters, or in the flower beds. Also check the neighbours’ yards, because wind moves things.
• Granules in the downspouts or at the bottom of them. The gritty surface of a shingle is what protects it. A pile of it where the downspout empties means it is coming off the roof.
• Dents in soft metal. Gutters, downspouts, vents, flashing, and metal window trim. This is the most useful ground-level hail indicator you have: if hail dented the gutters, it hit the roof the same way.
• Anything visibly out of line on the roof itself. Shingles sitting proud, dark patches, a ridge that has lost its cap.
• Damage to other things that took the same storm: the fence, the AC condenser fins, a car left outside, the mailbox.

Wind damage in particular is often invisible from below. Wind breaks the seal between shingle courses and drops the shingle back into place looking untouched. That shingle is now unsealed. You will not spot it from the ground, and that is exactly why a clean look from the driveway is not proof that nothing happened.

3. Check inside

The inside of the house tells you things the outside does not:

• Ceilings and the tops of walls. Fresh water stains, discoloration, bubbling paint, or a patch that feels soft.
• The attic, if you can get into it safely. Look for damp insulation, water tracks on the underside of the decking, wet rafters, and daylight coming through anywhere it should not.
• Around the chimney and vents, from the attic side. These are the places most likely to leak.

Do this on a dry day a couple of days after the storm as well, not only during it. Some leaks take time to show up inside.

4. Write it down

The documentation is not busywork. It is the thing you will not be able to reconstruct in six weeks:

• The date of the storm. This is the single easiest thing to lose and the one most often asked for.
• Photographs of anything you can see safely. The debris in the yard, the dented gutter, the stain on the ceiling, the granules at the downspout. Include something for scale in hail photos, like a coin next to a dent.
• What you noticed and when. If the ceiling stain appeared three days later, write down that it appeared three days later.
• Anything that was already there. Being straight about pre-existing wear is better for you than being caught out on it.

The National Weather Service publishes severe weather information and storm reports at weather.gov, which can help you pin down what actually came through and when.

5. Deal with active water

If water is coming in now, containing it comes before any of the above. Get a container under it, move what can be moved, and if a ceiling is holding a bulge of water, be aware that it can come down all at once.

Anything you do to limit further damage is reasonable and normal. Keep the receipts.

6. Be careful who turns up

Storms bring people to the area who are here for the storm rather than for the neighborhood. The Texas Department of Insurance publishes consumer resources on storm-related fraud. It is worth ten minutes before you agree to anything.

The short version of what should slow you down:

• An offer that expires today, or pressure to sign now.
• A large payment demanded up front.
• Anyone offering to take care of your deductible.
• Anyone telling you what your insurer will decide. They do not know that, and neither does anyone else before a claim is filed.
• A business you cannot verify or find again afterwards.

More on this: How to choose a Texas roofer and avoid post-storm scams.

7. Then get it looked at properly

Once the immediate things are handled, have someone qualified look at the roof and put what they found in writing. What you want out of that is an accurate description of the condition of the roof, which is useful whatever you decide to do next.

Questions about your policy, coverage, or a claim go to your insurer. The Texas Department of Insurance is the place to start for consumer questions about insurance in Texas.

If a storm has just been through

We look at storm-damaged roofs in San Antonio and the surrounding communities, and we tell you what we found in writing. What we will not do is tell you what your insurer is going to decide, because that is not ours to promise.

Call (210) 468-8279 or read more about storm damage roofing.