Whether your house is in Queens, Garden City or Scarsdale changes who has to approve a roof replacement, what gets filed, and how long the paperwork takes before a shingle comes off. Homeowners are often surprised that a roof needs a permit at all, and then surprised again that the process in Nassau County has almost nothing in common with the process in New York City. This guide lays out the three regimes we work in and explains what it means when we say that we file the paperwork.
A note on what follows: fees, forms and timelines vary by jurisdiction and change over time. We describe how each system works rather than quoting numbers, because the numbers would be wrong for somebody's address by the time they read this.
Why a roof replacement is permitted work
A repair, meaning replacing some shingles or slates, re-flashing a chimney, or fixing a leak, generally does not need a permit anywhere we work. A full replacement does, because it involves removing the roof covering down to the deck, and in most jurisdictions that counts as a structural alteration to the building envelope. The permit exists so that someone other than the contractor confirms the work was done to code, that the contractor was licensed and insured, and that the house's records reflect what is on it. It also protects you at resale, when a buyer's attorney asks for the permit and the sign-off on the roof.
New York City: the Department of Buildings
All five boroughs are under the New York City Department of Buildings. A full roof replacement is filed electronically through DOB NOW, the city's online filing system, by a registered contractor. The filing names the contractor of record, who has to carry the required insurance and, for residential work, hold a Home Improvement Contractor license from the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. REVMA's is 2126882-DCWP. The permit is issued, the work is done, and the job is closed out with a sign-off.
Two things about the city process catch homeowners out:
- Landmarks. If the house is in a designated historic district or is an individual landmark, any roof work visible from a public street needs a permit from the Landmarks Preservation Commission before DOB will issue its permit. That applies in Fieldston in the Bronx, in Park Slope, Brooklyn Heights, Ditmas Park and many other Brooklyn districts, and in Douglaston and parts of Forest Hills in Queens. In-kind replacement is the simplest approval. A change of material is reviewed. We sequence the LPC filing ahead of DOB so the two do not hold each other up.
- Attached houses. On rowhouses and semi-attached homes, work at a shared wall or a shared rear roof means notifying the adjoining owner before it starts. That is not a permit, but it is part of doing the job correctly, and we handle the conversation.
Street use is a separate matter. A dumpster or a material lift on the street needs its own permit from the Department of Transportation, and we arrange that when the property has no driveway.
Nassau County: towns and villages
There is no county-wide building department in Nassau. The county is divided into three towns, Hempstead, North Hempstead and Oyster Bay, plus the two cities of Glen Cove and Long Beach, and within the towns are dozens of incorporated villages. Each town runs a building department for its unincorporated areas, and each incorporated village runs its own. Great Neck alone contains several villages, each with its own office.
The practical consequences:
- The permit is filed with whichever authority actually covers the address, not the one whose name is on the mailing address. A house with a Manhasset post office address may fall under the Town of North Hempstead or under the Village of Plandome, and those are different offices with different forms.
- Villages are usually stricter than towns. Garden City and several of the North Shore villages apply architectural standards that constrain roof color and profile, and some require a review before the building permit is issued.
- Contractor registration is local. Most Nassau jurisdictions require the contractor to be licensed with the county or registered with the town, with insurance certificates on file, before a permit is issued in the contractor's name.
The Nassau County roofing page goes into the housing stock and the exposure. For permits, the short version is that we identify the correct authority for the specific address before we quote, because the lead time varies far more than the price does.
Westchester County: municipalities and the county license
Westchester works like Nassau, with a layer on top. Each city, town and village runs its own building department and issues its own permits, and several of them, Bronxville and parts of Scarsdale and Rye among them, apply architectural review that affects material and color. On top of that, Westchester County requires home improvement contractors to hold a county license. REVMA's is WC-38805-H25. A municipality in Westchester will not issue a permit to a contractor who does not hold it.
Historic properties add a further step in some municipalities, which maintain their own landmark designations and review boards. The Westchester roofing page covers the market. As with Nassau, we confirm the exact requirements for the address before the estimate, not after.
What "we file the paperwork" means
When we say we handle the permit, this is what we are taking off your hands:
- Identifying the correct authority for the address, including any Landmarks or architectural review layer.
- Preparing and submitting the application in our name as contractor of record, with our license and insurance on file.
- Preparing whatever the reviewing body needs to see, which for a historic district can include product data and photographs.
- Scheduling the inspections the jurisdiction requires. Most want to see the roof at some stage, often with the deck exposed or the underlayment down, and again at completion.
- Closing the permit out so that the record on the house is clean.
What you handle is signing the owner's authorization where the jurisdiction requires it and, for some villages, attending the architectural review if you want to. Everything else is ours.
Timing
The permit is the reason a roof in Garden City or Bronxville can take longer to start than a roof in Bayside. City filings through DOB NOW are usually the quickest to issue. A village with architectural review that meets on a schedule can add weeks. A Landmarks application adds its own review. None of this changes the roof itself, but it does change when the crew can arrive, and it is why we ask about the address before we talk about dates. If you are financing the roof, the financing approval can run in parallel with the permit so neither one waits on the other.
Getting a roof estimate anywhere we work
REVMA is based in Bayside, Queens and replaces roofs across Queens, the Bronx, Brooklyn, Nassau County and Westchester. We are licensed and insured, NYC DCWP license 2126882-DCWP and Westchester County license WC-38805-H25, and we file every permit in our own name. If you are not sure which authority covers your house, tell us the address and we will tell you. Call (646) 889-4529 or request an estimate. Common questions about the process are also answered on our FAQ page.