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Contact us for a Free Quote today
The storm rolled through. You walked outside, looked up, didn’t see any missing shingles from the driveway, and figured you got lucky.
Maybe you did. But here’s the thing about roof damage — the kind that ends up costing real money rarely announces itself from the ground. A storm that drops three-quarter inch hail across your neighborhood for twenty minutes can leave your shingles looking perfectly intact from the street while quietly setting your roof up to fail two or three years earlier than it should. No holes. No leaks. Not yet. Just a roof that’s been compromised in ways that only show up when you’re standing on it.
That’s what a professional post-storm roof inspection is actually for. Not to find the dramatic stuff — the missing shingles and punched-through decking that anyone can spot. It’s to find what you can’t see from thirty feet below, document it before the evidence weathers away, and give you a complete picture of what the storm actually did.
Roof Troops is a veteran-owned, GAF-certified roofing contractor based in Murfreesboro. We provide free roof inspections throughout Rutherford County — including Smyrna, La Vergne, Christiana, and surrounding communities. Call 615-258-9977.
Middle Tennessee sits in what storm scientists call a secondary severe weather corridor — not the heart of Tornado Alley, but well within the zone where Gulf moisture collides with cold fronts pushing down from the northwest in spring and early summer. The National Weather Service Nashville office tracks these events for the region, and the NOAA Storm Events Database documents the history: Rutherford County sees multiple documented hail and wind events most years, with significant events — stones an inch or larger — occurring with enough regularity that roofing contractors here treat storm damage assessment as a core part of the business, not an occasional specialty.
What that means for homeowners in Murfreesboro, Smyrna, and La Vergne: the question after any significant storm isn’t really “did anything happen to my roof?” It’s “what happened to my roof and is it worth filing a claim?” Those are different questions, and getting the answer right starts with an inspection by someone who knows what to look for.
Here’s the actual sequence, start to finish. Nothing mysterious about it — just methodical.
Before anyone sets foot on your roof, the inspection starts on the ground. This isn’t filler — it’s genuinely useful. The yard and the exterior of the house tell a story about what happened overhead.
Granules in the gutters and at the base of downspouts are one of the first things to check. Your shingles’ granules are the sacrificial protective layer — the mineral coating that takes the UV punishment so the asphalt underneath doesn’t have to. When hail hits, it knocks granules loose. A meaningful storm event will deposit noticeably more granules in your gutters than normal rain. If the downspout discharge looks like dark sand, that’s a signal worth following up on the roof.
Metal surfaces on the exterior tell the same story more clearly. AC condenser fins, soft metal trim, aluminum fascia, window screens — these materials dent at lower impact thresholds than asphalt shingles do. If the AC unit looks like it caught some serious pings and the gutters are dented, the shingles almost certainly took hits too. If those surfaces are clean, the storm may have passed without significant impact.
Satellite dishes, siding, wood trim, and even large-leafed plants in the yard can show impact marks from hail. A row of hosta plants that looks like it went through a paper shredder tells you the hail was moving fast and hard. All of this ground-level evidence gets documented before the ladder goes up.
Hail damage on an asphalt shingle is not obvious. Most homeowners expect something that looks broken. What hail actually leaves, in most cases, is subtler — and that subtlety is exactly why it matters that the person on your roof knows what they’re looking for.
The primary indicator of functional hail damage is bruising. A bruised shingle looks intact but the fiberglass mat underneath has fractured from the impact. The analogy that holds up best: a bruised apple. Drop it, the skin looks fine, but press on it and you feel the soft spot where the cell structure collapsed. Asphalt shingles work the same way. A trained inspector presses on the shingle surface at suspected impact points — if it gives with a soft, spongy feel that isn’t present on the surrounding undamaged area, the mat has fractured. The shingle won’t fail tomorrow. But it will fail years before it should have, and when it does, the mat fracture is the path moisture takes to your decking.
Granule loss from hail has a distinctive pattern that separates it from normal age wear. Normal granule loss from weathering is gradual and roughly uniform across the shingle field — the whole slope loses granules at a similar rate over years. Hail damage creates spots — random circular areas where granules were blasted away at the point of impact, exposing the dark asphalt mat underneath. Fresh mat exposure is shiny and black. Aged mat from normal wear is gray and oxidized. The freshness of the exposed mat relative to the surrounding surface tells an inspector whether this is a recent storm event or old age. The NOAA Storm Events Database helps verify timing — if records confirm a documented hail event in your zip code on a specific date, and your shingle mat exposure looks fresh, that’s the connection that supports a claim.
Beyond the shingle field, the inspection covers every component of the roofing system:
Flashing — the metal strips at every transition point on your roof, around the chimney, along dormers, at valleys, and where the roof meets any vertical surface. Flashing is often the first place a roof begins to leak after storm stress, because the fasteners loosen, the seal cracks, or the metal itself gets displaced.
Ridge cap — the shingles running along the peak of your roof take the most direct exposure to weather from every direction. After a significant wind event, ridge cap damage or displacement is one of the more common findings.
Pipe boots — every plumbing vent stack penetrating your roof has a rubber collar around it at the base. These collars degrade from UV exposure and hail impact and are among the most common sources of active roof leaks. Every boot gets checked for cracking, compression damage from hail impact, and seal integrity.
Ventilation components — soffit vents, ridge vents, box vents, and attic fans. Wind and hail damage to these affects both the structural integrity and the ventilation performance of your roof system, and inadequate ventilation voids manufacturer warranties including GAF’s enhanced tiers.
Gutters and downspouts — impact marks on the gutter channel and downspout elbows are among the clearest evidence of hail size and severity. Beyond documentation value, damaged gutters need to be identified because their function is directly tied to how water moves off your roof and away from your foundation.
A complete storm inspection includes checking the attic space when it’s accessible. This is where damage that hasn’t yet produced a visible interior ceiling stain shows up first — wet insulation, water marks on the underside of the decking, soft spots in the sheathing, daylight visible through penetration points. If water has gotten in anywhere, the attic is where the evidence accumulates before it works its way through to your ceiling.
Every finding gets photographed. Not a few overall shots — a systematic set that shows each damage point with enough detail to distinguish it from normal wear. Close-ups of impact marks with a reference object for scale. Wide shots establishing location on the roof. Photos of the gutters, the metal surfaces, the pipe boots, the ridge. Timestamped.
This documentation serves two purposes. First, it gives you an honest picture of your roof’s condition so you can make a clear decision about whether to file an insurance claim, schedule repairs, or monitor and reinspect. Second, if you do file, this documentation becomes the foundation of your claim — independent professional documentation gathered before the insurance adjuster sets foot on your property.
Hail damage that isn’t documented within weeks of a storm starts to look more like normal wear as the evidence weathers. The fresh mat exposure oxidizes. The granule deposits in the gutters wash away. The crispness of the impact marks softens. The sooner the inspection happens after a storm event, the cleaner and more defensible the documentation is.
Not every post-storm inspection leads to an insurance claim. That’s fine — and a contractor who tells you every inspection leads to a claim isn’t giving you honest information. Here’s how the decision actually breaks down.
If the inspection finds functional damage — bruised mat, compromised pipe boots, flashing failure, cracked ridge cap — and you’re within the one-year filing window from a documented storm event, filing a claim is almost always worth evaluating. The inspection documentation already supports it. The potential payout, especially under an RCV policy, likely significantly exceeds your deductible.
If the inspection finds surface-level granule loss without mat fracturing, and the shingles have significant age on them, the honest assessment may be that you’re looking at normal wear rather than a qualifying storm claim. Filing a claim for damage that gets categorized as normal wear creates a claims record without producing a payout, and that combination can affect your rates. A contractor who tells you that honestly is one you can trust with the rest of the process.
If the inspection finds your roof is in genuinely good shape — nothing significant to report — you now have a documented baseline of your roof’s condition at a specific date. That documentation has value if the next storm does produce damage, because it establishes a pre-storm condition record.
After any significant hail event in Murfreesboro or Rutherford County, the knock on the door starts within 24 to 48 hours. Contractors roll in from other states, work the neighborhood hard for a few weeks, and move on to the next market. Some of them are legitimate. Some of them are not.
A few things to look for before you let anyone on your roof. Ask for a Tennessee contractor’s license number and verify it through the Tennessee Board for Licensing Contractors. Ask for a certificate of insurance showing current general liability and workers’ compensation coverage — not a copy they carry in their truck, but a current certificate with your contact information on it. Ask how long they’ve been operating in Middle Tennessee specifically.
Roof Troops is based in Murfreesboro. We are here year-round, before and after storm season. When a warranty question comes up three years from now, we’re still taking that call. That’s what it means to hire locally.
If the inspection finds damage, you’ll get a written report with photos and the inspector’s findings. At that point the path forward is yours to decide.
If you want to file an insurance claim, the next step is calling your carrier and opening the claim. Ask the Roof Troops inspector to be present when the insurance adjuster comes out — this is your right as a Tennessee homeowner and it’s a service we provide. Having a qualified contractor on site during the adjuster’s inspection protects against findings being missed or minimized. For more detail on that process, see our insurance claim assistance page.
If the damage doesn’t warrant a claim but repairs are needed, we’ll walk you through the scope and give you a written estimate. No pressure. If the roof is genuinely fine, we’ll tell you that and you’ll have documentation to prove it.
Wind damage and hail damage that get caught early are repairs. The same damage found two years later after water has worked through compromised shingles into the decking and framing becomes a significantly larger and more expensive project. That’s the practical value of the inspection — not just the claim, but catching what needs to be caught before it compounds.
How soon after a storm should I schedule an inspection?
As soon as practically possible — within a few weeks at most. The documentation quality degrades as the evidence weathers, and you’re also working against the one-year filing window. There’s no cost to scheduling early. There can be a real cost to waiting.
Can I just check myself from the ground?
You can gather useful information from the ground — gutter condition, metal surface dents, ground debris. But the findings that actually determine whether you have a qualifying claim require being on the roof surface: pressing on shingles to check for bruising, inspecting pipe boots and flashing up close, checking the condition of ridge cap and valley flashing. A ground check is a starting point, not a conclusion.
What if I had hail but the damage seems minor?
Minor visible damage now doesn’t mean minor functional impact. A roof with widespread bruising that shows no leaks today is still a roof with a shortened service life and, depending on your policy, a legitimate claim. The inspection tells you what’s actually there. Make the call based on facts, not assumptions.
Does filing a storm claim raise my rates?
It can, depending on your carrier and your claims history. A large regional storm that affects dozens of zip codes simultaneously is generally treated differently than an isolated claim. Ask your agent specifically before filing. Most carriers can tell you the rate impact of a claim before you formally open one.
What does a free roof inspection actually include?
Everything described in this page. Ground-level documentation, full roof surface inspection, attic check when accessible, written findings, photos. No upsell pressure, no scare tactics. If there’s something to find, we’ll find it and tell you honestly what it means.
