Flat and Low-Slope Roofing in South Florida

The low-slope systems we install, and where each one belongs

There is no single best flat roof. There is a best roof for your deck, your slope, your rooftop traffic and what is going to be sitting on it. These are the systems we build and the honest case for each.

• Modified bitumen, two-ply — a base sheet plus a granulated cap sheet. The toughest system underfoot, forgiving of rooftop traffic and equipment service, and the easiest to patch cleanly years later. Our default on residential low slope.
• Self-adhered modified bitumen — peel-and-stick base and cap with no open flame on the roof. Common on plywood-decked homes and where a torch is the wrong tool near soffits, walls or landscaping.
• Torch-applied and hot-mopped mod-bit — still the right answer over concrete decks and on larger commercial fields where the crew has room to work safely.
• TPO single-ply — a white, heat-welded membrane, mechanically attached or fully adhered. The best reflectivity of the group and the usual choice on commercial buildings and larger flat areas.
• PVC — where kitchen exhaust, grease or chemical discharge would attack a TPO or asphalt surface. Restaurants and food processing, mostly.
• Coatings — silicone or acrylic over a sound, dry roof is a legitimate way to buy years. Over a wet roof it is a way to hide the problem until it costs more.

Where flat meets sloped — the joint everybody leaks at

The most common low-slope leak in South Florida is not in the middle of the field. It is at the wall where a Florida room, a screened-porch conversion or a garage addition ties into the main house, and it usually leaks because the original builder ran the membrane up to the wall and troweled tar over the joint.

That joint has to be built, not sealed. Every layer must direct water onto the top of the layer below it, with no reliance on any sealant to be the waterproofing.

• Membrane turned up the vertical wall to a proper height and terminated with a bar and sealant, so the water plane is continuous around the corner.
• Counterflashing let into the wall, under the stucco or behind the siding, lapping over the membrane termination instead of butting against it.
• The sloped roof above lapped over the low-slope system, never the other way around.
• AC stands, skylights, hatches and vent penetrations raised on flashed curbs rather than bedded flat into the field.
• Parapets treated as part of the roof — membrane up the back side, cap flashing over the top, and the coping joints detailed for movement.
• Screen enclosures and porch conversions checked at the beam and header, where the original structure was never built as a conditioned roof.