A Willingness To Work Hard Saved Me $8,000

2022 is the year that my family plans on going solar. We haven’t nailed down the particulars of the system yet (more on that in another post), but we know we have to replace the roof prior to installation since ours is on its last leg.

I went through the headache of getting four different roofing companies to come out and give us quotes. After all that, I finally decided to go with a company we used a few years ago on our last house. The benefit of having several different companies come out to give roofing estimates is that you get a different recommended scope of work from each one. 

As with the last time we had our roof done, I kept hold of suggestions common to most of the installers and had those added into the final scope of work. This time, that meant the possibility of having to re-deck our entire roof. 

To put that in perspective, our roof would likely require about 100 sheets of plywood to re-deck. The lowest installer price for plywood sheets to accomplish this was $85 per sheet. $8,500! That’s in addition to the cost of the rest of the roof replacement (what you’d normally expect in the $10-$15k range). Ay ay ay.

One thing that my installer mentioned stuck out to me when I discussed this with him: 

“If you had the clips holding your pieces of plywood together, I wouldn’t hesitate to go ahead and reuse this decking. But you can see, where the pieces meet, they flexed over time. They just won’t handle the weight of the roof plus panels in this condition.”

Wait a tick. I asked him if there were any ways he could think of that we could retroactively install the clips. No. Was there any other method to replicate the clips? Simpson strong ties?

“Well, I could have my guys come in and brace the space between each rafter with 2x4s. That way when we have the roof shingles off, they can nail the edges of the decking to the bracing to snug it up all the way down the edges of each plywood piece. But the labor for that job is going to run about the same cost as the deck replacement…”

I asked him a few follow-up questions about how they would be affixed (toe-nailing each side with nails), 2×4 face perpendicular or parallel to the decking (parallel), etc. I told him I had the tools to do the job myself and that I’d call him back in a few weeks when it was done. He told me the job was going to suck, and good luck. We shook hands.

He was right—it wasn’t a particularly fun time I spent in the attic.

The Job

I precut as many of the 2x4s as I could and got to work. Of course, my roof couldn’t have been just a simple A-frame. Nope! It had to be a hip roof, which provided additional headaches (or, more accurately, bodily aches) for me as I maneuvered my body and tools around the various struts and joist orientations. To boot, the attic is also not floored—just loose insulation blown throughout that obscured the joists from sight. 

As my family likes to remind me, in our last house, I put my foot through our bedroom ceiling from the attic when I misstepped once. Though I was determined not to make that mistake this time around, not being able to see the joists complicated matters…*

So I built a little “sled” out of some old pallet skids and 5/8-inch plywood. After all, I had to maneuver myself and my tools all the way out to the skinny part of the roof near where it meets the eaves. The sled spanned the 24-inch joists and gave me a small platform to kneel and lie on.

Even with my sled, this was tough work. I quickly found a need for my angle grinder to grind/remove the roofing nails that were sticking through the roof decking. The 2x4s needed to be mounted flush with the roof decking, so those little protrusions had to be removed.

Here is a pretty common, step-by-step example of mounting just one of the 2x4s: 

• 1: Measure the rafter span (if different than the standard 22.5-inch span) and cut the board to length.
• 2: Position the sled/platform underneath the rafter span and move tools to the sled.
• 3 (if applicable): Remove the attic baffles to access the plywood seam.
• 4: Use the angle grinder to cut off the roofing nail points along the plywood seams (do your best to avoid the glowing-hot metal shards falling down onto you).
• 5: Fit the 2×4 in place and toe-nail it in place on the rafters on each side.
• 6 (if applicable): Reinstall the attic baffle with a staple gun/crown stapler.

Then, repeat about 150 times. Don’t forget about the garage roof, too!

Wrap-Up

This project took me about 35 hours, including planning. For the cost of the 2x4s to get the job done ($400) plus nails ($100) for the framing nailer, the job is done and we saved about $8,000. 

That’s an hourly rate of $228—well above what I earn in my day job. And all because I was willing to roll up my sleeves and put in the work.** Go figure. 🙂

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*Job completed. No drywall damage!

**And a well-deserved shout out to my awesome wife who did the more important job of parenting our Little Man while I was busy “in the square.” <–This is a reference to what my son said when he saw me in the attic through the access panel (from the hallway outside his bedroom). “Daddy’s in the square!” It’s so funny how their little brains work <3