It was not a hurricane. It was three days of wind off the ocean.

Wind from the northeast finds what a summer storm misses

Most St. Johns County roofs face the afternoon thunderstorm from the southwest. A nor'easter comes from the other direction, for days, and pushes rain up under the shingle edge on the slopes that never get tested. That is why the first drip on a twenty-year-old roof so often shows up in November or March, not August.

The county was built in waves. A block of 1920s and older homes downtown, 1950s and 1960s ranches in St. Augustine South and Davis Shores, and then one enormous run of shingle roofs from World Golf Village to Julington Creek between 1995 and 2008. Those roofs are now at the age where an insurer asks the year before it asks anything else.

A local contractor who works both the island and the interstate corridor can tell you which roof you have: a single lifted course and a wet spot, or a roof that has reached the end. One visit tells you what it needs.

What the crew does on a St. Johns County roof, and why it matters to you

What happens	What it means for you
The crew walks the roof and checks the attic before anyone quotes anything	The drip over the stairs gets traced to the seam that actually let the water in, which is often uphill and around a corner
Wind-lifted shingles are resealed or replaced by the course, not by the slope	A repair after a nor'easter stays a repair when the rest of the roof is sound
Fasteners, flashing, and trim on the ocean side of A1A are specified for salt	An island roof stops failing at the small parts first
The Certificate of Appropriateness is filed before the permit on a historic-district house	The roof downtown gets done once, with the review built into the schedule instead of discovered mid-job
Photos, measurements, and a written scope on every job	You have a document for an adjuster, an architectural committee, or a buyer instead of a memory
Permits pulled through the county, the City of St. Augustine, or St. Augustine Beach, whichever the address needs	The roof gets inspected during and after the job, and the permit record follows the house

Stay off the wet roof: what to do before you call

Do not go up. A wet shingle roof after a nor'easter is slick, and a wet metal roof is worse. Put a bucket under the drip, move what is under it, and take photos of the ceiling and of the roof from the ground. Water tracking down a wall toward an outlet means that breaker gets switched off first. Then call. Whether the roof needs a patch or a full tear-off is not something you have to figure out. Tell us what is happening over the stairs; the contractor works out what it means.

St. Johns County specifics that change the job

The coast from Ponte Vedra to Summer Haven is a wind-borne debris region under the Florida Building Code, and the design wind speed steps down as you move inland toward Hastings. St. Johns County is well outside the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone, but shingle fastening, underlayment, and roof-to-wall connections are all inspected items on a re-roof permit here.

Matthew passed offshore on October 7, 2016, and pushed two to seven feet of surge into the bayfront, Davis Shores, Lincolnville, and Vilano. Irma did it again on September 11, 2017. Ian dropped sixteen inches of rain on the island in September 2022 and Nicole followed in November with the beach erosion that put houses on the edge at Vilano and Summer Haven. Helene flooded the same low streets in September 2024, and Milton three weeks later set a record on Deep Creek and put five feet of water on parts of Hastings and Flagler Estates. Between the named storms, nor'easters do the quiet work on roofs every fall.

Re-roofs in unincorporated St. Johns, which includes Nocatee, World Golf Village, Julington Creek, Vilano, and everything south of the beach city, are permitted through the St. Johns County Building Department. Addresses inside the City of St. Augustine or the City of St. Augustine Beach go through that city's own building desk, and the historic districts add a review board step. Each area page on this site says which office handles that address.

Will my homeowner policy pay for a nor'easter roof leak?

We cannot tell you what your policy will pay, and we make no promise about coverage. The adjuster decides. Sudden wind damage is usually the kind of loss a Florida homeowner policy covers. A hurricane deductible applies to named storms, the policy excludes wear and age, and since January 2023 you must report a new claim within one year of the loss. What the contractor hands you, photos, measurements, and a line-item scope, puts facts in front of the adjuster instead of your recollection of the roof. If water is still coming in, call before the adjuster visits, because tarping and stopping the damage come first. For the sequence, from tarp to adjuster visit, read the insurance claims page. Before the next storm, St. Johns County Emergency Management posts evacuation zones and shelter openings.

We serve these St. Johns County communities

We serve St. Augustine and its neighborhoods from Lincolnville to Uptown, Davis Shores and the rest of Anastasia Island, St. Augustine Beach, Butler Beach, Crescent Beach, Vilano Beach, Ponte Vedra Beach, Nocatee, Palencia, World Golf Village, Julington Creek, Fruit Cove, Switzerland, St. Augustine South and the Shores, and the farm country around Elkton, Hastings, and Flagler Estates. The areas page lists every nearby community by name.

Call (904) 895-7548 and tell us what the roof is doing. We put you through to an independent local roofing contractor anywhere in St. Johns County.