What Do Homeowners Say About Roofing Companies? Common Praise and Complaints

Survey data on what homeowners praise and complain about with roofing companies, Florida-specific red flags, and a checklist to use before you sign.

By Hytz Roofing

2026-10-02

Homeowners mostly say the same few things about roofing companies, good or bad. In national surveys of homeowners, the most common complaints are surprise costs, poor communication, and delays, while the praise in strong reviews centers on clear updates, a clean jobsite, and a crew that finished when promised. In the 2026 Homeowner Roofing Survey by Roofing Contractor magazine, roughly one-third of homeowners named unclear or unexpected costs as their biggest challenge, and 23% each named poor communication and delays.

This guide from Hytz Roofing, a Tampa, Florida roofing contractor, pulls together what that survey data, consumer-review research, and Florida enforcement actions show about homeowner experiences, and turns it into a short checklist you can use before you sign a roofing contract.

What Are the Key Takeaways About What Homeowners Say?

Cost surprises lead the complaints. About one-third of homeowners in the 2026 Roofing Contractor survey said unclear or unexpected costs were their main frustration with roofers.
Communication still matters a lot. Poor communication was the top complaint in the 2025 edition of the same survey (roughly 40%) and was still named by 23% in 2026.
Reviews drive the shortlist. About 62% of surveyed homeowners called online reviews very or extremely important when choosing a roofer.
Recent reviews count most. BrightLocal's 2026 consumer survey found 74% of consumers look for reviews written in the last three months.
In Florida, the worst stories involve insurance promises. The Florida Attorney General has taken action against a roofing company accused of promising homeowners they would only pay their insurance deductible and then billing far more.

What Do Homeowners Complain About Most With Roofing Companies?

Roofing complaints cluster around a handful of issues, and the survey numbers line up with what shows up in one-star reviews. Roofing Contractor magazine's annual homeowner survey, run with myClearInsights Hub Research, asks homeowners what their biggest challenge was when working with a roofer. The two most recent editions show the pattern:

Homeowner complaint	2025 survey (fielded fall 2024)	2026 survey (completed October 2025)
Poor communication / lack of updates	Roughly 40%	23%
Unclear or unexpected costs / lack of transparent pricing	18%	Roughly one-third
Quality of workmanship	25%	Not reported as a top item
Delays	Not reported as a top item	23%
Trouble verifying credentials	Not reported	9%

The answer choices were not worded identically each year, so treat the year-over-year shift as a direction rather than a precise trend. Still, the takeaway is consistent: homeowners rarely complain about shingles. They complain about not knowing what the roof will cost, not hearing from the contractor, and waiting longer than expected.

Why do cost complaints come up so often?

Cost complaints usually come from scope that was not spelled out at signing. Common triggers are rotted roof decking discovered after tear-off, code-required upgrades, and change orders priced after the fact. A written estimate that lists the price per sheet of replacement decking and states how extra work will be approved removes most of that surprise.

Why is communication such a common complaint?

Homeowners and roofers often use different channels. In the 2026 Roofing Contractor survey, 56% of homeowners said they prefer phone calls, while contractors most often lead with email. The same survey found 56% of homeowners expect a reply within one to two days, and 39% expect a same-day response. A roofer who goes quiet for a week during a job will almost always hear about it in a review.

What Do Homeowners Praise in Roofing Company Reviews?

Positive roofing reviews tend to praise the experience around the roof, not just the roof itself. The themes that come up again and again in strong reviews mirror the complaint list in reverse:

Clear pricing up front, with no surprise invoice at the end.
Proactive updates about crew arrival, weather delays, and inspections.
Speed, especially after storm damage, when a tarped roof is a daily worry.
Cleanup: magnet sweeps for nails and a yard left the way it was found. Messy jobsites are a long-standing source of complaints to the Better Business Bureau (BBB), according to contractors interviewed by Roofing magazine.
Help with paperwork, such as permits, final inspections, and Florida-specific programs like the My Safe Florida Home grant.

Hytz Roofing's own reviews follow this pattern. Hytz has more than 250 five-star Google reviews, and the ones featured on its customer reviews page highlight hurricane and storm replacements, fast turnaround, professional crews, and help getting approved for the My Safe Florida Home grant.

How Much Do Homeowners Rely on Reviews When Choosing a Roofer?

Homeowners lean on reviews heavily, but word of mouth still comes first. In the 2026 Roofing Contractor survey, 74% of homeowners said they follow a recommendation from a neighbor, friend, or family member, 50% use search engines, and 11% used AI search tools, the first year the survey tracked that channel. About 62% rated online reviews very or extremely important, another 30% called them important, and only 9% said reviews did not matter.

Broader consumer data points the same way. BrightLocal's Local Consumer Review Survey 2026, a survey of 1,002 U.S. adults published in February 2026, found:

97% of consumers read reviews for local businesses.
74% look for reviews written in the last three months.
47% will not use a business with fewer than 20 reviews.
31% will only use a business rated 4.5 stars or higher, up from 17% in 2025.
80% say they are likely to use a business that responds to all reviews.

For a roof, which most homeowners buy once or twice in a lifetime, those habits make sense. A contractor's recent reviews and how it answers unhappy customers are the closest thing to a test drive.

What Do Florida Homeowners Say That Homeowners Elsewhere Don't?

Florida roofing complaints carry an extra layer: insurance. After a hurricane, the most damaging stories are not about workmanship but about promises tied to an insurance claim.

In September 2025, the Florida Attorney General sued a roofing company under the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act after reviewing more than 130 complaints. According to reporting by the National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA), homeowners said the company told them they would pay only their insurance deductible, then billed them substantially more after installation. When customers refused, the company placed liens on their homes and sued more than 250 customers. In March 2026 the Attorney General asked the court for a temporary injunction to halt foreclosures and release those liens.

Florida law already limits these sales tactics. Section 489.147 of the Florida Statutes bars residential roofing contractors from offering to waive or rebate an insurance deductible, from offering gifts or anything of value in exchange for an inspection or claim, and from interpreting insurance policy coverage unless licensed as a public adjuster. For contracts signed within 180 days of a declared state of emergency, the statute gives homeowners a 10-day cancellation right. Violations can bring fines of up to $10,000 per violation.

In practice, if a review mentions a roofer who promised a "free roof" or said "you'll only pay your deductible," read that as a red flag, not a compliment.

How Can You Tell If Roofing Reviews Are Real?

Fake reviews are now illegal at the federal level, which makes them riskier for businesses but not extinct. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) finalized a rule in August 2024 that bans fake or AI-generated reviews, paying for positive or negative sentiment, undisclosed reviews by employees or company officers, and using threats to suppress negative reviews. The rule gives the FTC authority to seek civil penalties.

Signals that a roofer's review profile reflects real customers:

Reviews are spread over months and years, not dumped in one week.
Reviewers mention specifics: the neighborhood, the roof type, the crew lead, the inspection date.
There is a mix of ratings, and the company replies to critical reviews calmly with a fix or explanation.
The story is consistent across Google, the BBB, and other review sites.

For a deeper walkthrough of scoring a review profile, see Hytz's guide on how to evaluate roofing contractor reviews online.

How Do You Avoid Becoming the Next Bad Roofing Review?

Each common complaint maps to something you can check before signing. Use this as a pre-contract checklist:

Common complaint	What to ask or check before you sign
Unexpected costs	Get a written, itemized estimate that includes a per-sheet price for decking replacement and states how change orders are approved.
Poor communication	Ask who your single point of contact is, how you will get updates, and how fast the company returns calls.
Delays	Ask for an estimated start window, how weather delays are handled, and who pulls the permit and schedules the final inspection.
Workmanship	Ask which manufacturer warranty you will receive and whether it covers workmanship, and confirm the contractor's certification with the manufacturer.
Unverified credentials	Look up the contractor's license on the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR) site at myfloridalicense.com.
Insurance-related promises	Walk away from any offer to waive your deductible or cover it with a rebate. That offer is prohibited under Florida Statutes section 489.147.

Hytz Roofing holds Florida license #CCC1332551, is a GAF Master Elite contractor (a certification held by a small share of roofers certified by GAF, a major shingle manufacturer), and has more than 30 years of roofing experience in the Tampa Bay area. You can verify each of those claims yourself using the steps above, and you should do the same for any roofer you consider.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are BBB complaints a reliable way to judge a roofing company?

BBB complaints are useful but incomplete. Many satisfied customers never post on the BBB, so a small complaint count does not prove quality on its own. What tells you more is how the company responded: whether complaints were answered and resolved, and whether the same problem repeats. Read BBB complaints alongside recent Google reviews and a license check.

Should one bad review rule out a roofer?

One bad review should not rule out a roofer with a long, consistent record. Roofing involves weather, insurance, and inspections, so occasional friction is normal. Look at what the complaint was about and how the company replied. A pattern of the same complaint, such as repeated surprise bills or unanswered calls, is the real warning sign.

Is a perfect 5.0 rating suspicious?

A perfect rating is not automatically suspicious, but check the details. A 5.0 average built over years with specific, detailed reviews is believable. A 5.0 average from a burst of short, generic reviews posted in a few weeks deserves a closer look, especially now that the FTC rule bans fake and paid-sentiment reviews.

Where can I find unbiased information about a Florida roofer?

Start with sources the contractor does not control: the Florida DBPR license lookup, the BBB profile, the manufacturer's contractor locator (for example, GAF's directory confirms Master Elite status), and Google reviews. Then ask neighbors who had roofs replaced recently, since personal recommendations remain the most-used source in homeowner surveys.