Instant Roof Estimate

What the Instant Roof Estimate does

Precision's Instant Roof Estimate gives a price range for replacing the roof on a one- or two-family house in any of New Jersey's 21 counties, worked out from the house's outline in Microsoft's and FEMA's public building data, checked on New Jersey's 2020 aerial photo, and your answers about the roof.

It prices architectural shingles, and a membrane where the roof is flat. When we can price your roof online, your range shows as soon as you tell us how to reach you; when we can't, we call you to price it.

No address handy, or pricing metal, slate or cedar? Our Roof Cost Calculator gives market ranges for any roof type and size, with no address and no contact details.

How it works

1. Enter the address. We find the lot in New Jersey's public address records.
2. Look at the state's 2020 aerial photo of the lot and tell us, yes or no, whether it is your house. Where we are confident of the roof we found, it is outlined; there is nothing to draw or adjust. If it isn't your house, or we can't trace the roof reliably, we ask for its size instead.
3. Answer a few questions about the roof. Each one says why we ask. Where the U.S. Geological Survey's laser survey can measure your roof clearly, we fill in the steepness answer for you to check.
4. Tell us how to reach you. When we can price your roof online, your range shows on the next screen, and we usually email you a copy with a private link back to it. When we can't, we call you to price it.

Then we call you back the same day to set up your free roof inspection. Nothing is booked until we talk.

How we size your roof

The size comes first. When we can measure it reliably, the tool starts from your house's outline as seen from above, its footprint. A roof covers more than that footprint: the eaves hang past the walls, and the steeper the pitch, the more roof it takes to cover the same ground. That is why the tool asks how steep your roof is.

When we can't measure the outline reliably, as with many attached homes, or when the photo doesn't show your house, the tool asks for its living space instead, and how many floors it has: the same living space on two floors sits under a smaller roof than on one.

For the rule of thumb that turns a footprint into roof area, see our Roof Cost Calculator.

How we work out your range

We start with the size of the roof: from the building outline in public data, kept to your own lot, or from the house size you give us. Then your answers move it:

• Steepness. A steeper roof has more surface than its footprint and takes more time to work on safely.
• Height. Higher roofs need more ladder work and staging.
• Old roofing. Every layer that comes off adds labor and dump fees.
• Roof shape. Each dormer, valley, skylight and chimney needs flashing and careful cutting.
• Flat parts. Flat sections need a membrane, not shingles.

You get a range and not one number because nobody has been on the roof yet. Answering "Not sure" widens the range; we don't guess for you.

How close the range is

It is a range and not a price because nobody has been on your roof yet. The aerial photo is from 2020 and the building outlines are a few years old, so an addition built since then may not show. From above, nobody can see soft or rotted deck boards, a hidden second layer, or how hard the lot is to work on, and those are what most often move a roof's price. Your free roof inspection settles them, and you agree the price in writing before any work starts.

Where the data comes from

The photo is New Jersey's 2020 aerial imagery, from the state's Office of GIS. The building outlines combine Microsoft's Global ML Building Footprints with FEMA's USA Structures data. The address and the lot come from the state's public address and parcel records, where we also read the property class that tells a one- or two-family house from a larger building. We never look up who owns a property, and we never ask for your device's location. The photo and the outlines are a few years old, so a recent addition may not show.

The roof's slopes come from the U.S. Geological Survey's public lidar, a laser survey flown over the area between 2014 and 2019, depending on the county. It is read in the background once we have found your house, and only where it can measure the roof clearly: it is used only to fill in the steepness answer, which you can change, and your own answers still decide the range.

Imagery: NJ Office of Information Technology, Office of GIS (NJOGIS), 2020. Building outlines: Microsoft Global ML Building Footprints (CDLA-Permissive-2.0, cdla.dev/permissive-2-0) and FEMA/ORNL USA Structures (CC BY 4.0), modified. Address points and tax parcels: NJ Office of Information Technology, Office of GIS (NJOGIS). Lidar: U.S. Geological Survey, 3D Elevation Program.