The Real Reason Your Roofer's Quote Is So High Right Now (2026)

Samed Guvenc

Founder & Director

GA Licensed

Atlas Certified

Owner-Operated

Published: 2026-03-14

Updated: 2026-03-14

You called around, got a few quotes, and your stomach dropped. $13,000 for a roof? Three years ago somebody on Nextdoor said they paid $8,000.

Yeah. We hear this every single day. And we get it — sticker shock for roofing is real. Nobody budgets for a new roof like they budget for a vacation. It just hits you all at once and the numbers feel impossible.

But here's the thing most roofers won't tell you: we don't love the prices either. Our costs have gone up dramatically, and we're caught in the middle — between rising input costs and homeowners who (understandably) remember what things cost a few years ago. So let's open the books and show you exactly where the money goes.

The Breakdown: Where Your $13,000 Actually Goes

Here's a realistic breakdown for a typical 2,000 sq ft Savannah home with architectural shingles:

Why Labor Is 55% of Your Bill (And Rising)

This is the single biggest reason your quote is higher than what your neighbor paid in 2022. Labour is the majority of any roofing project, and finding experienced roofers is getting harder every year.

Think about it — roofing is physically brutal work. You're on a hot roof in Savannah's 95-degree summers, carrying 70-pound bundles of shingles, bending over for 8-10 hours straight. Fewer young people want to do it. The guys who've been doing it for 20 years are retiring. And the ones still working can name their price because every roofing company in town is trying to hire them.

Workers' comp insurance alone for a roofing crew costs more than most people's car insurance for a year. That cost gets built into your quote — there's no getting around it.

The Tariff Tax You Don't See

Even though most asphalt shingles are made in the U.S., the raw materials and chemicals that go into them aren't. Here's what happened in 2025:

Those increases got passed directly from manufacturers to distributors, from distributors to us, and from us to you. Not because anyone in the chain is being greedy — because nobody in the chain can absorb a 6-10% increase on materials that already have razor-thin margins.

The Hidden Costs Nobody Mentions

Beyond the obvious material and labor costs, there are line items that add up fast:

How to Tell if a Quote Is Fair (Or If You're Being Overcharged)

Here's our advice when you're comparing quotes:

The Bottom Line: You're Not Getting Ripped Off

We know it feels that way. A $13,000 bill for anything feels enormous. But when you break it down — the labor, the materials, the tariff-inflated accessories, the disposal, the insurance — there's not a lot of fat to trim. The roofers who quote significantly less than everyone else are almost always cutting corners you won't see until the first bad storm.

We'd rather be upfront about costs and do the job right than give you a lowball number and find hidden fees later. That's how we've built our reputation in Savannah — and that's why customers keep referring us to their neighbors.