The Cooler on Your Roof Is a Hole in It

Yes. Re-roofing a home in Colton requires a building permit through the City of Colton Building Division, and the work is inspected. If the scope also includes removing a roof-mounted evaporative cooler and closing the opening, or resetting one onto a rebuilt curb, that should be described in the permit application rather than treated as incidental — it involves the roof structure, not just the covering.

The inspection is the part worth having. It is the independent confirmation that the deck was repaired where it needed to be, that the underlayment and flashing went on correctly, and that a curb or a closed-off opening was framed properly rather than covered over. None of that is visible to you once the roof is finished. The permit also puts a dated record of the work on the property, which matters at resale and increasingly to insurers. We file it at the start of the project.

If you are not using it, almost certainly yes. A disused cooler is a hole through your roof deck that you are paying to maintain — the curb still has to be flashed, the flashing still degrades, and the unit itself is a weight sitting on framing that has often been damp for years. Removing it, framing the opening closed and roofing over it eliminates the penetration permanently, and doing that during a re-roof costs far less than doing it as its own job.

If the cooler is still in service, that is a perfectly reasonable answer too — evaporative cooling works well in this climate and is cheap to run. In that case the right scope is to lift the unit, rebuild or repair the curb, flash it properly with counterflashing rather than sealant, and reset it. What we would not recommend is the third option, which is what usually happens: leave it in place, work around it, and seal the edges. That is the version that has you calling somebody again in three years.

Easily, and this catches people out constantly. Water entering at a roof penetration does not fall straight down. It lands on the top of the deck or runs down the outside of a pipe, then travels along framing — a rafter, a joist, a ceiling member — until it reaches a low point or a seam where it can drop through. That can be a long way from where it got in, and it can be on the other side of a room.

The same is true of plumbing vent boots, which crack in this sun and leak down the outside of the stack inside a wall cavity, surfacing at the bottom of a wall rather than on a ceiling at all. It is one of the main reasons chasing a leak by looking directly above the stain is unreliable, and why an inspection that includes the attic side is worth more than one that only walks the roof. The attic is where the travel path is actually visible.

The usual drivers apply — area, pitch, assembly, how many existing layers come off, deck condition and roofline complexity. On the older housing here the penetrations are the additional variable: a roof with a cooler curb, several vent stacks and a flue is more detail work than the same area with two penetrations, and if a curb has framing damage under it that is carpentry rather than roofing.

Californian roofing costs run above the national average because of labour rates, materials and the state’s licensing and permitting requirements. What we commit to is a free inspection and a written estimate that prices the penetrations as named items rather than absorbing them into a square-foot figure, with deck and curb framing repair costed rather than left open. That is also what makes another bid readable next to ours. Financing is available and the 15% remodeling coupon is running.

We can handle it. That is one of the practical reasons the licence classification is worth checking before you hire: CSLB #1105333 is Class B General Building, which covers the roof, the framing, and the coordination of the mechanical and plumbing connections a cooler involves, using licensed specialty trades where the work calls for it.

The alternative is the split that produces the problem in the first place. A roofing-only contractor asks you to arrange for someone to lift the unit, works around the gap in the schedule, and then asks you to arrange for it to be reset — and if there is a leak afterwards, the two parties each have a reasonable account of why it is the other one’s responsibility. Doing the disconnect, the curb, the flashing and the reset as one scope means one person is answerable for whether it leaks. That is worth more than the small amount it saves.

Yes, and around a cooler curb the framing is usually the part that matters most. A curb that has been taking water at its base for years puts moisture directly into the members framing the opening, and sometimes into the deck around them. That is structural repair rather than cosmetic, and it needs doing while the roof is open — going back later means opening it again.

Under the Class B licence the whole path is one scope: the curb and its framing, the deck, the flashing, the fascia and soffit if water reached them, insulation that has been repeatedly wet, and the drywall, texture and paint under the stain. Wet insulation is worth mentioning because it is invisible and it stops working — in a city with a long cooling season that is a monthly cost you carry without seeing it. Free roof inspection, and financing if the full scope is more than you want to fund at once.