New Hampshire
Supplements written for New Hampshire roofs, valley and mountain alike
A nor'easter works a Manchester roof for a full day at a time, an ice dam backs water up under the shingles somewhere no ground inspection will ever see, and the White Mountains carry a snow load that older mountain town framing was not always built to hold. One statewide code sets the floor. What a town has layered on top of it is where the real answer lives.
By Kyle Hamrick, Founder
The Estimate Company is run by a licensed independent insurance adjuster, and the license is specific to five states: South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, Texas, plus Alabama. New Hampshire is outside that list, plainly. A New Hampshire contractor gets an Xactimate scope built against the state code and whatever a town has amended on top of it, and a supplement written to survive a carrier that has read a thousand ice dam claims before this one.
This desk holds no adjuster appointment in New Hampshire and never becomes party to a homeowner's claim. That stays entirely between the homeowner, the carrier, and your company. Our end of the work is the estimate itself: the scope, the local amendment research, and a package built to survive contact with a desk adjuster who has seen a few thousand ice dam files already.
The Estimate Company is run by a licensed independent insurance adjuster, with claims experience across many states, writing for contractors nationwide. What we bring to a New Hampshire file is code mechanism, carrier behavior, and claim pattern, confirmed for the address rather than assumed from a statewide rule. More about Kyle.
What actually damages roofs in New Hampshire, and what it does to the estimate
Manchester and the Merrimack Valley: the nor'easter pattern
Manchester sits in the Merrimack River valley, where a nor'easter tends to funnel rather than pass through quickly, and the storm's duration is what does the damage. Wind driven rain and wet, heavy snow work a roof for the better part of a day, and the housing stock taking that punishment ranges from dense triple-decker mill housing to brick commercial buildings to postwar suburban development, each with a different failure pattern in the same storm.
Underneath the visible wind damage sits the quieter problem: heat escaping an underinsulated attic melts the snow pack on the field, that meltwater runs to the unheated overhang, and it freezes into a dam that backs water up under the shingle courses. The shingles above it can look completely fine. The loss is in the soffit cavity, the fascia, and the wall behind it, and none of it is visible from a ladder. The roof claim inspection checklist is the field order that gets the interior evidence documented before a repair erases it.
The White Mountains: a load problem, not just a cold problem
North of the valley, the White Mountains region carries a genuinely different winter. Snow accumulates and stays for a full season rather than melting between storms, and a lot of the camp and cabin construction scattered through the mountain towns predates any consistent expectation that a roof would carry that weight for months at a stretch. The evidence of an overload is structural, not cosmetic: sag between bearing points, sheathing that has cupped or delaminated under sustained moisture, and fastener pull that a ground level inspection will never catch.
The seacoast: a short coastline with its own exposure
New Hampshire's coastline is short, but the towns near Portsmouth take the same nor'easter wind and rain as the valley plus a salt exposure the inland communities do not see. Metal components corrode faster near the water, and a supplement written off an inland material default is specifying the wrong metal for the environment the roof is actually sitting in.
The code argument that moves a New Hampshire file
A statewide floor, and a local ceiling on top of it
New Hampshire adopts a single State Building Code under RSA 155-A, administered through the Office of the State Fire Marshal, so there is a genuine statewide baseline to start from, unlike a state that hands the whole question to the county or the city. What makes the citation incomplete if it stops there is RSA 155-A:3 together with RSA 674:51, which let a municipality adopt its own local amendments on top of the state code as long as those amendments do not weaken the statewide minimum. A town with a documented ice history can require more at the eave than the state floor asks for, and a supplement that quotes only the state code has quoted the floor, not necessarily the ceiling that applies at that address. Verify with local building dept Confirm any local amendment layer with the municipality that issues the permit, and do it before any citation goes on paper.
Replacement still means the old covering comes off
Once a roof's scope of work crosses from repair into full replacement under the adopted state provisions, the existing covering has to be removed down to the deck rather than covered over. That determination drives the tear off and disposal math, and it holds regardless of which town's local amendments sit on top of the state floor, because the removal requirement lives in the base code both layers share.
The carriers writing New Hampshire, and where the policy language claws recovery back
Liberty Mutual, State Farm, MetLife, and the Concord Group carry a large share of the residential book here, and the Concord Group's regional standing matters more than its size suggests. A New England mutual staffed by people who have handled a career's worth of ice dam files reads a specific, well documented claim differently than it reads a generic supplement package, and the difference shows up in which files get a second look without a fight.
Winning the field argument does not end the file, either, because the policy language can take the recovery right back. Metal-denting carve-outs, roof settlement schedules that pay an aging covering less than full replacement cost, and storm deductibles set against the dwelling limit rather than a flat dollar figure all turn up on New Hampshire forms often enough that the declarations page needs a read on day one, not a discovery after the scope ships. Where one of those provisions has already reduced a payment, depreciation recovery is the separate claim built to answer it.
New Hampshire offers nothing comparable to a state-backed insurer of last resort, which means a property the voluntary market will not touch lands with a surplus lines carrier instead, complete with its own claim forms and its own patience for a thin estimate. After a major nor'easter or a heavy mountain winter, catastrophe crews move through the state on a fixed daily inspection count, and speed through the queue is what gets measured. The reinspection supplement exists for the files that stall out until the carrier finally sends someone back onto that roof, at which point the evidence package is already sitting there waiting.
What gets recovered on a New Hampshire roof file
Ordered by how often the item is missing when a file reaches our desk.
Status key: In scope. Usually omitted. Code driven. Verify with the authority having jurisdiction. Every status is spelled out in words beside the item, so nothing depends on color.
Ice dam damage at soffit, fascia, and interior wall cavity
Usually omitted
The dam forms outside the field of view a ground level inspection usually covers, and the water it traps moves under the shingle courses toward the wall rather than staying at the surface. The estimate that skips it is not being careless, it is simply looking at the wrong part of the building.
Local amendment layer on top of the state ice barrier and eave provisions
Verify with local building dept
New Hampshire's state code sets a floor, and a town's local amendments under RSA 155-A:3 can require more than that floor for eave protection in a town with a known ice history. Confirm what the specific municipality has layered on before assuming the state minimum is the whole requirement.
Rafter strain from a full season of accumulated snow in the White Mountains region
In scope
Camp and cabin framing in the mountain towns was rarely engineered with the expectation that snow would sit on the roof for a full season rather than melting between storms, and a rafter carrying that load too long shows it as a gradual dip and sheathing gone soft with trapped moisture, never as a single dramatic failure.
Full removal of the existing covering under the state code's replacement rules
Code driven
The adopted state code treats a lay over and a genuine replacement as two different projects, and once a file is a replacement, everything already on the deck comes off before anything new goes down. That haul-off and disposal is its own line, not a rounding error absorbed into the new shingle price.
Drip edge at eaves and rakes
Code driven
A large share of the state's older housing stock, particularly the mill town triple deckers and farmhouse era construction, predates the current requirement, and the absence only becomes visible once the existing covering is off the deck.
Corrosion resistant flashing and valley metal near the seacoast
In scope
The stretch near Portsmouth and the short New Hampshire coastline takes salt exposure that inland metal never sees, and specifying flashing rated for that environment is a like kind and quality match, not an elective upgrade.
Starter course at eaves and rakes
Usually omitted
Take the starter strip out of the assembly and the shingle no longer performs to its rated wind speed, and a nor'easter sitting over Manchester for a full day is a fair test of that rating. Manufacturers price the strip separately for a reason, and folding it into the field shingle line quietly deletes that reason.
Sawing, venting, and closing the ridge as separate labor
Usually omitted
Cutting the ridge open comes before the vent goes in, and the terminations still need closing once the cap sits on top. A supplement that prices the cap shingles and calls it done has quietly assumed the cutting and the closing were free.
Removing and resetting solar arrays and mounted mechanical equipment
Usually omitted
A crew cannot strip and replace a roof deck with a solar array or a condenser bolted through it, so the equipment gets pulled, held safely somewhere else, and reinstalled once the new covering is down, and that whole cycle is its own labor line regardless of whether the carrier's estimate ever noticed the mount was there.
Plank decking replacement with fastener upgrade on older housing stock
In scope
Older New Hampshire framing, especially in the mill towns and the farmhouse stock scattered through the Merrimack Valley, often carries board decking with gaps a modern nail pattern cannot land in cleanly. Nobody sees that condition until the tear off strips the deck bare, which is exactly why it shows up as a supplement instead of an original estimate line.
Interior finish damage that surfaces days after the storm
Usually omitted
A dam that has been quietly backing water up all winter, or a nor'easter's sustained rain load, does not always announce itself on the ceiling until well after the adjuster's first pass, and by then the estimate that closed the file has already missed it entirely.
Overhead and profit on multi trade files
In scope
A winter loss that puts roof, gutter, soffit, and interior finish on one claim needs a general contractor sequencing those trades on one schedule. The number of trades on the job earns the entitlement, not the dollar total at the bottom of the estimate.
Each becomes a written line with a reason attached, inside a real Xactimate file. Depending on the claim it ships as a roofing supplement, an Xactimate supplement package, a supplemental estimate, or a full claim estimate written from scratch.
What happens to your file after you send it
- 01
The carrier estimate gets read line by line against the roof
Not skimmed. We pull the estimate apart against your measurements and photos, marking every line where the assembly written does not match what that roof needs in that jurisdiction.
- 02
Code and manufacturer requirements get sourced before they get argued
In New Hampshire that means starting from the state code adopted under RSA 155-A and then checking whether the municipality has layered its own local amendment on top, because the state text is a floor, not the whole answer for every town.
- 03
The supplement is written in Xactimate and delivered as a PDF
Real file, real price list, real sketch. You get the PDF as the deliverable, and the ESX free any time you ask for it. Retail estimate work with no supplement attached delivers the ESX. Written same day or next day, submitted next day. One to three extra days on large commercial and multi structure work.
- 04
We stay on the file until the carrier answers
Follow up, desk adjuster calls, and reinspection support when the carrier sends someone back out. Response runs about three weeks as a general expectation, and the file does not close on our side because it went quiet on theirs.
Two promises, stated separately
Promise one: the fee
The standard fee is 15 percent of supplemental recovery. If a file produces no additional approved recovery, you pay nothing on that claim. That is the whole fee structure, and it applies claim by claim.
Promise two: the guarantee
Send us an average of 2 claims per week for 12 months. If that volume does not produce a minimum of six figures in additional margin for your company, we write you a $5,000 check at the end of the 12 months. The volume, the 12 month term, the six figure threshold, and the $5,000 figure are one set of terms and they always travel together.
Two different promises, no overlap. The fee describes what a single claim costs you. The guarantee describes what a year of steady volume is worth. Nothing in the fee structure is a guarantee, and the guarantee does not change the fee.
New Hampshire questions we get from contractors
Does New Hampshire run one building code, or does the town change the answer?
There is a single State Building Code adopted under RSA 155-A, so unlike a state that hands adoption entirely to the county or the city, New Hampshire starts from one statewide floor. What changes town to town is the ceiling above that floor: RSA 155-A:3 and RSA 674:51 let a municipality adopt its own local amendments on top of the state code, as long as those amendments do not weaken the statewide minimum. A supplement that only cites the state code is citing the floor and may be missing whatever a specific town has layered on top of it.
Why does an ice damming claim get denied as maintenance so often here?
Because the damage sits where the desk adjuster is not looking. The dam forms at the eave, and the water it backs up travels uphill under the shingle courses toward the wall long before it reaches anywhere a ladder inspection would catch it. A carrier reading a cold file, with no interior photographs and no account of how the water traveled, defaults to calling it deferred maintenance. Beating that default takes documentation built for exactly this argument: moisture readings, interior photographs, and a plain account of where the water started and where it ended up.
Is the White Mountains region really a different file than Manchester and the seacoast?
Different enough that a template written for one produces a wrong number on the other. Up north, snow accumulates and stays for a season, and older camp and cabin construction in the mountain towns was not uniformly built to a load standard that anticipates it staying that long. Manchester and the Merrimack Valley take a more conventional nor'easter and mixed winter storm pattern, and the coastal towns near Portsmouth add salt exposure on top of that. Three regions, three different failure patterns, inside one small state.
What actually proves an ice dam loss when the shingles look untouched?
Interior evidence, because the exterior often shows nothing. Stained plaster or drywall at the top of an exterior wall, moisture readings taken at the soffit and the wall cavity, and photographs of the actual ice formation at the eave while it is still there, tied together into one narrative of how the melt started and where the refreeze caught it. Without that package a desk adjuster has no reason to look past the shingles, because nothing on the shingles told them to.
How much does a supplement typically recover?
On claims where the roof is already approved for full replacement, our own closed files show a median recovery of about $4,000, with half landing between roughly $1,800 and $9,500. Claims that start denied or repair-only run far higher.
How fast is turnaround, and what does it cost?
Estimates are written same day or next day and submitted next day. Larger commercial and multi structure files take one to three extra days, said up front. Carrier response runs about three weeks as a general expectation. The standard fee is 15 percent of supplemental recovery, and a file with no additional approved recovery owes nothing on that claim.
New Hampshire markets
Merrimack Valley
- Manchester and the Merrimack River valley
Also covered
- Concord and the state capital corridor
- Nashua and the southern tier
Concord, Dover, and Nashua files run through the Manchester desk. Work also comes in from Portsmouth and the seacoast, and from the White Mountains mountain towns.
Send one file and see what the shingles hid
Forward the carrier's estimate, your field numbers, and the policy declarations. The package that comes back next day names whatever local amendment that town has layered over the state code, and it documents the interior evidence a ground level look never catches.