The Improvement Ledger, No. 12 of 20<\/p>\n
This entry introduces the most important idea in the whole series: some money you spend not to get it back, but so the house can transact at all. The instructors call it sellable, and a roof is where they teach it.<\/p>\n
Entry No. 12 is the roof most American houses actually wear. Thirty squares, 3,000 square feet, of architectural asphalt shingles: $28,256<\/b> in the 2021 national Cost vs. Value data, $17,147<\/b> back, a 60.7 percent<\/b> recoup. Against the standing seam metal roof from entry No. 16, asphalt costs 39 percent less and returns 4.6 points more. Cheaper and better, the pattern that rules this series.<\/p>\n
And these are not your grandfather’s shingles. The spec is the architectural grade, not the flat three tab: real thickness, dimensional shadow lines, multiple asphalt colors, wind ratings that genuinely impress a thirty year contractor. Manufacturers now warrant many of them as lifetime shingles against defects, provided the installation is done right. Why is asphalt cheaper? Labor. A quicker install cuts the price for everyone, and roofs are priced by the square, install included.<\/p>\n
The printed spec: 30 squares of architectural style asphalt shingles with a ridge vent and all accessories and underlayments. A square is 100 square feet of roofing, and 3,000 square feet of roof covers roughly a 2,200 to 2,500 square foot single story house, because overhangs and pitch make every roof bigger than the floor plan under it.<\/p>\n
The course numbers, No. 12 of 20, 2021 national report<\/p>\n
Here is the idea that earns this entry its place in the ledger. Roofs are prime deferred maintenance, ridden out for years because nothing leaks yet. The tells are visible from the driveway: shingles curling, shingles breaking apart, gutters filling with granules washed off the surface. Then the course delivers its punchline: nobody wants to buy a house that leaks. You will spend $28,000 and see about $17,000 back, and the instructors say plainly that the point is something else. Your home becomes sellable.<\/p>\n
That completes the course’s three reasons to spend money on a house. Return, the Cost vs. Value table. Use value, the kitchen you cook in for fifteen years. And sellability, the spending that makes the transaction possible at all. A failing roof is category three. The percentage is not the point. The sale is the point.<\/p>\n
The 2025 San Francisco metro figures: job cost $38,289<\/b>, resale $27,747<\/b>, a 72.5 percent<\/b> recoup, versus 76.2 percent for the Pacific region and 67.5 percent nationally. Our metro pays asphalt back at nearly three quarters, 25 points ahead of metal in the same 2025 data. For a house heading to market with a tired roof, this is the version of the project the math endorses.<\/p>\n Cost recouped, 2025 report<\/p>\n