Roof repair costs

Repair, reseal, or replace: which roof bill is yours?

The plywood deck under the membrane decides it. A torn or cracked membrane sitting on dry, solid decking is a sealant-and-patch job. Once the deck has gone soft, the work becomes carpentry: a section repair with new decking runs $1,500 to $4,000, and rot that has spread across the roof turns it into a replacement.

Here's the ladder. Routine resealing runs $75 to $200 in DIY materials, or $250 to $600 for a mobile tech's annual seam-and-penetration job. A single leak caught at the entry point costs $75 to $350 yourself or $300 to $1,200 at a shop. Let that same leak soak a section of decking for six months and it's $1,200 to $4,000. A full replacement runs $3,000 to $22,000, and most owners land between $4,500 and $12,000.

What moves a replacement quote

Size and construction, more than anything. An EPDM membrane swap on a 26-foot travel trailer at an independent shop and a fiberglass rebuild on a 40-foot Class A with rotted decking are both called a roof replacement. They aren't close in price. A 40-foot Class A roof covers 400 to 600 square feet against roughly 300 for a 30-foot trailer, so you're buying a third more material to twice as much before labor starts, which is why motorhome roof replacement runs $6,000 to $22,000.

The other number that moves is EPDM versus TPO. Dicor's EPDM Plus runs $770 for a 20-foot roll and about $1,500 at 50 feet; its TPO membrane, sold as DiFlex, is $600 to $1,100 across the same lengths. Doing a rubber roof replacement yourself costs $600 to $1,700 in materials. Hand it to a shop or mobile tech and it's $3,500 to $13,000.

Where a coating fits

A roof coating goes over an existing membrane. It doesn't replace one. Brushing or rolling it on yourself costs $150 to $1,300 in materials, a basic coat from a mobile tech runs $750 to $1,800, and branded turnkey systems such as FlexArmor or RV Armor run $4,250 to $9,500. The chemistry has to match the roof: Dicor's elastomeric coating for EPDM is $45.99 a gallon and its fiberglass coating is $74.99. Factory TPO is a special case, since most coating makers don't recommend covering it at all.

The stain is rarely under the leak

Water runs along the underside of the membrane and across the deck until it finds a screw hole or a seam, so the entry point can sit five or ten feet from the ceiling stain you noticed. That's why a shop that patches only the spot above the stain often sees the rig again. If water has already reached the interior, price the roof and the water damage together; most shops quote both in one visit.

On an older towable, run the math before you authorize anything. A $3,000 roof job on a $9,000 travel trailer is a real decision, and the camper roof repair guide walks through it: on a 15-year-old camper worth $8,000 to $12,000, a $3,500 roof job is 30 to 40 percent of the rig's value, and that math rarely makes sense. Once a repair estimate passes 50 to 70 percent of market value, most owners total the rig out or sell it as-is, per the water damage guide.