SignalsAZ.com Prescott News Podcast - What to Know Before Monsoon Season Hits Your Roof

Episode Date: March 30, 2026

Send us a text and chime in!Toby Farnsworth shares what homeowners should know about roof maintenance, inspections, and storm damage before monsoon season arrives. The episode covers how small issues like worn sealant and aging materials can lead to bigger and more expensive problems if they go unchecked. Farnsworth also explains how insurance works for hail and wind damage, and why roof condition can become a major factor during home sales. It is a practical look at how regular inspections can help Arizona homeowners protect their homes and plan ahead.Check out the CAST11.com Website at: https://CAST11.com Follow the CAST11 Podcast Network on Facebook at: https://Facebook.com/CAST11AZFollow Cast11 Instagram at: https://www.instagram.com/cast11_podcast_network

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to Signals News podcast. Today I have Toby Farnsworth. You are a roofer. Yes, Farnsworth and Sons, Roofing. So you say Sons, how many sons you got? I have four sons. Currently. Currently. Currently, he says, you know, in case he finds a couple more, I want to come to work with words. I'm like, oh, we need. I tend to have adopted sons, you know, younger gentlemen that come to work with me. I just kind of adopt them. That's awesome. So I kind of call them sons too. Everybody needs a mentor. Everybody needs somebody that they can look up to. I sure did myself. Yeah. Yeah. I think a lot of us can look back at that one person that made a

difference in our life and to have that power to be able to change somebody's life or just be there for them. And had you not or had you not had that person in your life, what could happen? Yeah, I had a couple of men in my life when I was younger and finding my way that really, really made a difference and pushes me to do what I do today. So yeah. And it helps you be that person to other people. That's awesome. So you have a roofing company. Yes, ma'am. And that's got to be fun in the summer. Right now, it's got to be awesome because it's not too, it's going to be warm in the next couple of days. But how did you get into roofing? So originally I was a carpenter, right I worked for one of the West Coast largest framing companies in Arizona and the West Coast

and I like I really like carpentry it captivated me and I had a friend that worked with me while we were framing and he started a roofing company and I went to go work with him right and I started learning the roofing industry and I had three younger sons that integrated into the roofing they didn't like carpentry you can make a lot more money a lot faster with the roofing so So it captivated them. And so I, you know, I looked at them one day and said, hey, you guys want a roof? We'll go roof. Let's go roof.

You're like me. It's one when I said we have five kids. And it was always like, oh, we're going to the park. Do you think it'll be crowded? Not until we get there. So want to start a baseball team? Well, we've got cover all the bases and a few outfolders. So we're good.

So you guys, you just want to go start a company. Let's do it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So it actually started, so like I go to church, right? And I told my wife, I said, I think God's wanting us to start our own roofing company, you know? And I said, I think he wants us to save X amount of money, right? And it was a large amount, you know?

And I was working for a local roofing company doing sales. And my wife responded with, okay, but we need X amount of money for a home base, you know, like a nest egg. And so that number was so big, you know, and I was like, okay, I was like, you know, here we go. Let's put that. Yeah. Then eventually I was down doing the Baja on the peninsula with one of my buddies. And my wife called me and she said, have you seen the make account? And I looked at the main account and it would hit that number.

And then I got scared, you know, because I had to take the next step. Yeah, yeah. So that was the next steps. I got scared. And then so I went and signed up to take the test. And actually, actually we have a, I have what's called a KB1 license. What is that? It's a general.

So I figured if I'm going to do roofing, you know, with my carpentry experience, that I would just put those together. But right now I just focus mainly on roofing because I want to get that up and running and self-sustained and then move in the building, you know, if there's an opportunity. So we're getting into, we've got spring, but behind spring, it's always going to be summer and with summer comes all those wonderful monsoons. What do I need to know about my roof before the monsoons hit? Yeah, that's an awesome question. So what we run into a lot is homeowners don't understand or, you know, they don't understand that their roof has maintenanceable items on them

that need to be inspected once in a while. That's such as cocking. Like when we install a roof, There's, there's a pipe jack to pipe terminations. There's exposed nails and stuff like that that we, silicone. Silicon has a shelf life, especially in Arizona with the UV rays, you know, hot cold, hot cold. So those need to be inspected. I would say, you know, you would be safe maybe every year and a half to two years to look at those items. Yeah. So that's kind of like something that we want to, you know, we want to be proactive about.

because we get a lot of calls about leaks, right? And, you know, they can be detrimental, and it's usually worse than they could have been originally, the actual. I would have never guessed that I should have somebody checking my roof. It is scary being a homeowner because we've talked to a couple people last, you know, since we've been doing these podcasts. And, you know, the garage guy, you should be checking this every six months. You should be, you know, doing, you know, check your gutters, be checking this. And the thing with a roof, though, it is not a cheap fix. You know, maybe a cheap fix, but to replace the whole roof is that is an undertaking to get that done.

And if I do regular maintenance, is that kind of going to prolong that life of having to get the new roof on the house? Well, I think it will prolong any kind of leaks that you're going to have, but it also gives you a realistic idea of what condition your roofs in now, you know? So, like, we do free roof inspection. And a lot of companies in the area will do a free roof inspection. We take a tablet and we go up there and we take pictures of everything that we see may need to be serviced or may not need to be serviced or the condition of the shingles, right? So the homeowner is not hit with that cost, you know, all at once, right? So they can plan for what that cost. You know, there's financing options, you know, but it's good to know.

You know, we can put in the back of our mind and not think of it and then have something drastic happen later on. Does homeowners insurance cover the route? Like, how does that work for how much? Yeah, so we do a lot of insurance work. So homeowners insurance covers, we were covers for hail. We have a high hail area here. That's why you see so many roofing companies. And also wind damage, right?

And then any damage from a storm, like if a tree broke a branch and flew into the roof, those things are covered. With my experience with insurance, what's covered is it's called sudden, catastrophic, right? So hails sudden and catastrophic, right? When blows, shingles off, they have to attribute the loss to a storm, right? So if you get up there and like all your granules are gone or something, you know, if it's premature granular loss, that's going to be a shingle warranty issue. But we can't put that on insurance because it's not like sudden and catastrophic. That's kind of like where it's like, well, Leisha, this was not sudden. It was 20 years of. Yeah. I mean. And the average roof in Arizona here, you know, is 15 to 20 years shingle because of the hot cold, hot cold, you know, the weather that incurs, you know.

You're doing well if you get 20 years out of your shingle roof here, 25. I'm getting nervous. My house is 20 years old this year. So it's like, I think that's like when you hit 40, things start going wrong with your. It's like, wait, my eyes don't work anymore. This doesn't work anymore. And now it's like, oh, we're at that 20 year mark. things are probably going to start going wrong.

Yeah, it's good to get to checked out and just see where you're at, you know, and see. I also thought about, too, when, like, when we bought our house, an inspector goes and they check everything, I would imagine a roof is probably high up on that list for inspectors. Yeah, yeah. So we do see a lot of times, you know, the roof will be a deal breaker for a home closing. I always try, I work with a lot of realtors. I always try to pre-program the realtor if they're selling the home to allow me to look at it and see if there is when damage or hail damage. That'll allow the seller to get the roof replaced prior to putting the roof on the house on the market.

You know, and that's a little bit easier for them because if there is viable damage there, they're only liable for their deductible. So that's, you know, most deductibles are 1,000. I've seen 500, 1,000, 2,500. under that area. And then a lot of times the realtors are past that point and I'm up there and I'm giving an estimate that they negotiate out of the home, right, out of the overall sale to, and the terms are for them to give the buyer that money so they can replace the roof. So those are the two options, you know, that I see a lot. I think the scary thing, though, is if I'm going to buy a house and we're talking about, well, the roof hasn't been serviced or the roof is old. What else has

been neglected in the house? And I might get a little cold feet and possibly back out of a deal. Yeah, for sure. What we see a lot is like, you know how it is when you buy a house. If you find the house you like, you really want it. You know, so you're willing to give and take a little bit with that. I've seen houses that are perfectly fine, you know, but the roof's not. And that's, and like that is a big deal. Yeah. You know, it's a big deal. You know, it depends on the home area.

Like, if they, if they're hard set on it, you know, they'll make it work out. But what is the most popular roof style in our area? Shingle. Shingle. Definitely shingle roofs, yeah. So, and you guys specialize in that as well. Yes, ma'am. That is awesome.

So you guys will do, so you've got the shingles. You have, so if you came out to my house and I said, did a great job on that, but could you also fix this? You got that going on too, huh? Yeah. You can fix all the stuff. A little bit selective, but yeah. And then what areas do you service around here? I mean, I'll go anywhere in Arizona, right? If it makes sense, I try to stay out of Phoenix in the summer. That's, I try and it never works out. So my gosh. Yeah. So if it's 100 degrees, which would be a cool day in Phoenix in the summer, how, what's the temperature up on that roof and you're sitting there on those shingles? It's hitting there. Asphalt's hot.

The roof is hot. It gets so hot sometimes you have to stop installing because you don't want to scar the shingle. Yeah, or melt. Your feet melt to the roof of the house. Yeah, you don't want to scar it up and you want to sell a good product. So that will happen sometimes. You know, take a break. Depends on, you know, how hot it is.

Because I've seen guys where they're up on the roof and I'm looking at one of the pictures, you've got the black. So you're standing on the black. You're just, I mean, no shade. Yeah. Yikes. Yeah, it takes a special kind of person to get up there on roof for sure. Well, when we were talking, I was talking to the gutter guy.

Yeah. And he was saying, like, you know, the last thing you want to do is climb up on a ladder and check stuff out yourself because it's just, I mean, so easy to get injured doing that. So if you think you've got a leak, if you think something's going on, if you just think it's been a few years, you want to have your roof inspected, how do they get a whole? do you? So our website, we have our website and the local office phone number is all listed on Google. So you've got Farnsworthroofing.com and then a good phone number I found on Google, 928-632-9091. You guys are out in Dewey, so that's cool. You got Toby. He's going to go anywhere.

Yeah. Take care of you. Yeah. I mean, that's what we specialize in. That's our job. And like I said, It's a free estimate, you know. And we're going to show you photos of what's actually there, of your roof. You know, a lot of, and that's cool about technologies. We can take a tablet, take pictures and bring your roof down to you at your kitchen table, you know, where you're not on a ladder and you don't really understand what you're looking at, you know. So that kind of, we really like doing that because a lot of people just don't know. Well, and it's, it, I would love to see the pictures as opposed to, you know, I get Alicia, you know,

you came in here for an oil change, but I don't even know how your car made it in here. You're going to need this and this and that on your air filter. It's like, really? Yeah. Seemed fine to me. Yeah, just changed it yesterday. No, I'm just kidding. Really?

Because you didn't know that you changed the last time. Yeah. So, yeah, so to be able to actually see it. Although one time they did bring out my air filter and they're like, I said, that's my air filter. Oh, it's really bad. Oh, yeah. You can go and change that. Yeah.

So, not a bad idea. So if you're looking for a roof, you guys, do you guys do, you guys do free estimates as well? Yeah, yeah, it's free inspection and free estimate. We do shingle, tile, in the commercial area, we do TPO. I do a lot of metal, standing scene, PBR panel. Nice. So, yeah, we do all types of roofing. Perfect. So check them out at Farnsworthroofing.com. There's also a place you can just go and put your information in. If I don't want to talk to anybody, you'll just come in and set all that up. I don't mind talking to people, but I know my kids hate talking to people now.

Yeah, that's the new generations like that a lot, yeah. So also we're GAF certified, which is the shingle manufacturer that's, you know, we really, really install a lot of GAF. It's basically the only shingle that I will install because, like, of their warranty programs. and also because of they, I want to say their warranty department, right, has always backed up what they said. So that's something that's big for me. Like I'll install this product, right, as long as you say what you're going to do, and they've always done that. So there's actually another site, GAF website. You can go in there and we're on that as well.

Okay. And request a free us on that too. That would be awesome. But I recommend you go on to Farnsworthroofing.com. Go straight to Toby. You can also give them a call, like we said, at 928. 632, my eyes are terrible because I'm over 40 now. 632-9091.

Give them a call and they will come check out your roof. Awesome. Toby, thanks for coming in. Yeah, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. No problem. Guys, we will see you next time. Thank you.