Decorations on a multitude of homes from Tampa to St. Petersburg make this a festive time in Florida. Thanks to our mild weather in December, putting up lights and other holiday decorations is a more enjoyable activity here than it is in cold climates where overnight lows have already dipped below the freezing mark. Yet home decorators in any part of the country can unknowingly cause damage while decorating if they don’t recognize potential hazards.
The most common type of decoration is lighting. It’s wise to test your lights before putting them up, and discard any lights that malfunction as an electrical short is a common cause of house fires during the holidays. But the roof is not a recommended place for holiday lights due to the need to secure them. While many lights can be wrapped around a tree or stapled around windows, the use of staples or nails to secure lights on the roof may permanently damage your roofing materials. Even a relatively small hole in a roofing system can allow moisture to penetrate your roof and begin rotting or causing leaks. A safer option would be to secure light strands with clips along the eaves of the roof.
Some homeowners will decorate with giant inflatable products in the front yard or on the roof. This fun and colorful items are attention grabbing, but can also be damaging if they are secured to a roof using staples or nails. If your decorations from the store don’t come with directions, a reliable and safe alternative for securing them can come from using zip ties and small sand bags for weighing them down in the valley of the roof, for example. Tying large decorations to a chimney is also an option.
Regardless of how you decorate, always use caution and practice a safety-first approach to ensure your holiday is a trouble-free and pleasant one. Then, once the holiday decorations come down and you’re ready to talk about roof repair or replacement, give Arry’s Roofing a call. You can reach us at 727-938-9565 or visit us at www.arrysroofing.com.
