To make that perfect dream house you have to make sure that the roof is done properly. A leaky roof can devastate the best looking homes. Thus making the correct choice of roof shingles for your house can matter a lot. This is the factor which decides whether you are going to be forever worried by a leak prone roof that has a limited life span and demands constant attention, or be a proud owner of a water proof, weather proof and long lasting roof that asks for minimum maintenance.

The decision depends on many factors. General climate of the place where your house is, the material of existing roof if present and your local building norms and conditions are the important issues that you need to take care about. Apart from it the other thing that is generally in the minds of people is the prevailing style and trend about the looks of roof shingles.

In earlier times there were very limited number of options in terms of materials for roof shingles and people had to settle for one thing or the other. But now, with advancement in technology, people are spoilt for choices. Today you have thousands of options in terms of durability, looks, quality, finish, color, shape etc to suit everyone's individual needs and preferences.

Roof Shingles

Nowadays the most popular and trendy choice for material for roof shingles is the composition roof shingles. It is generally 2 to 3 feet long. It is made of substances like tar, thick felt, crushed rock and other suitable materials all formed together into a single section.

The advantage of these roof shingles is that they are quite pocket friendly. Apart from this, they are also available in a wide variety of styles and colors and thus you have a lot of options to choose from. They can be put to multiple uses on top of a newly built roof, or a roof from which old roof shingles have been removed. They can also be put over and above the existing roof shingles. Composition shingles have an excellent fire resistant property. So it is also approved and preferred choice as the material for roof shingles by most building norms.

Another very trendy option is the tile shingles. It is especially convenient and suited to houses in hot climates and stucco homes. Though they are very sturdy and tough, they have somewhat complicated methods of installations and repair. The tile shingles are rather heavy so it is important that the house on which roof they are going to be installed is well built and strong structured.

Another material for roof shingles that has been there for quite some time is the cedar shingles. But today, more and more people are avoiding its use because of the fire risk that they possibly create. Apart from it they require a lot of attention and care as their appearance has to be maintained properly and that requires regular cleaning.

In spite of this factor, cedar shingles have a royal look that the other materials can't seemingly match up to and so more and more manufacturers are trying to make look alike of the cedar shingles in form of composite type shingles. These shingles are also resistant to fire, fade resistant and require minimum or no maintenance.

If you are living in snow prone area then the best option for you is metal roof shingles. They allow snow to slip easily. This reduces probability of roof dent or collapse due to weight of snow. Thus you have a lot of options when it comes to roof shingles and you choose the best according to your needs.