Apartment, Condo & HOA Roofing in Vancouver WA and Portland OR
Multi-family roof repair, cleaning and phased replacement for property managers, HOA boards and building owners across Clark County and the Portland metro.
Schedule My Free Roof Inspection
Northwest Roof Maintenance has worked on multi-family roofs across Southwest Washington and the Portland metro since 2004
We repair, clean and replace asphalt shingle and cement tile roofs on apartment complexes, condominium communities, townhomes and HOA-managed properties. Work is done by our own background-checked W2 crews — we do not subcontract. Every building is documented with photos before, during and after, so boards and owners have a record for their files.
Licensed in Washington (#NORTHRM887DL) and Oregon (CCB #196307).
Roofing built around how multi-family properties actually get managed
A twelve-building complex is not twelve houses. The roof work has to fit a budget cycle, a board approval process and a building full of residents who live there while it happens. That is usually where multi-family roofing goes wrong — not in the installation, but in the coordination around it.
We plan the work the same way you have to fund it: building by building, season by season, with a written condition assessment that tells you which roofs need attention now and which can safely wait.
How do you handle work on occupied buildings?
We plan the disruption before we plan the crew. Before work starts we give you a building-by-building schedule you can post for residents, including which days each building is active. We agree on staging and dumpster placement in advance so resident parking is not lost without notice, and we confirm work hours against any quiet-hours rules in your CC&Rs. Crews tarp and protect landscaping, walkways and parked vehicles daily, and we sweep for fasteners and debris at the end of every working day rather than at the end of the job.
Unit access is the other piece. Most exterior roof work needs no entry at all. When interior access is required — an attic hatch, a leak investigation inside a top-floor unit — we schedule it with your office and give residents notice rather than knocking cold.
Can the work be phased across multiple budget years?
Yes, and for most properties that is the right approach. Rather than a single capital event, we can sequence replacement across buildings over two to five years, prioritizing by measured condition instead of by guesswork. That lets a board fund the work from reserves in stages while we hold the worst roofs stable with targeted repair and moss treatment in the meantime.
We provide the condition data in a form you can hand to your reserve study provider or attach to a board packet.
What do you provide for a board vote or bid package?
Every proposal includes a per-building scope and price, photo documentation of current condition, the material specification, the warranty terms, and our license, bond and insurance certificates. Boards comparing bids need the same line items from every contractor to compare anything meaningfully, so we write our scopes to be read side by side.
If your board needs a walkthrough of the proposal at a meeting, we will attend.
Why does ventilation matter more on a multi-family property?
Because a ventilation defect on a complex isn’t one roof’s problem — it’s the same defect on every building. These properties were built to one set of plans by one crew, so if the ridge venting was undersized or the soffit intake got blocked, it happened on all of them, and the failures arrive on the same timeline.
When air can’t move from soffit to ridge, warm moist air from the units below condenses on the underside of the sheathing. It looks like a leak but isn’t one. Sheathing softens, insulation mats down and stops working, and shingles fail years before their rated life.
Nobody catches it because nobody’s looking — attic access on these buildings is limited and rarely inspected until something visible goes wrong. We check the attic side where access allows, because putting new shingles over a ventilation problem buys you a roof that fails early and a moisture problem you’ve sealed in.
The fix is cheapest during a reroof, when the deck is already open. On a phased property that means it gets corrected building by building as each phase comes up. If we find it on a building that isn’t due yet, we’ll tell you and price it separately — some of them shouldn’t wait.
Our Services
Scheduled inspections and tune-ups across every building on the property — loose tabs, worn flashing, early moss caught before they become leaks. On a multi-family property this is what keeps a routine budget line from turning into a special assessment.
Leak diagnosis, resealed flashing, replaced tabs, valley and underlayment work on shingle and tile. Carried out by technicians who work for us directly, never a subcontractor — the same crew from building four to building twelve. Standalone repairs carry a 2-year workmanship warranty.
Soft, tool-only removal of moss, needles and debris, followed by preventive treatment. Never pressure washing, which strips granules and can void manufacturer warranties. On a large property with mature canopy, cleaning is often the difference between a roof that reaches its service life and one that fails early.
For roofs genuinely past the point repair can help: full tear-off replacement, backed by a 14-year labor warranty and Malarkey Certified Pro Contractor installation. Staged building by building across budget years on larger properties, so the work fits your reserves rather than forcing a single capital event.
What Makes Us Different
We’re not a franchise and we don’t subcontract. Every technician who sets foot on your roof is background-checked, trained, and works for us directly — not a crew we hired out for the day. We’ve been doing this in Clark County since 2004, and our approach has always been the same: tell homeowners the truth about what their roof needs, whether that’s a $30 fix or a full replacement, and let the honesty speak for itself.
That’s earned us 4.8 Rating and 700+ reviews and an A+ BBB rating — and it’s why we’re careful never to recommend more than a roof actually needs. Every visit, from a routine cleaning to a full inspection, includes photo documentation, so you can see exactly what our crew found and what was done, without having to take our word for it.
Can the work be phased across multiple budget years?
Yes, and for most properties that is the right approach. Rather than a single capital event, we can sequence replacement across buildings over two to five years, prioritizing by measured condition instead of by guesswork. That lets a board fund the work from reserves in stages while we hold the worst roofs stable with targeted repair and moss treatment in the meantime.
We provide the condition data in a form you can hand to your reserve study provider or attach to a board packet.
What do you provide for a board vote or bid package?
Every proposal includes a per-building scope and price, photo documentation of current condition, the material specification, the warranty terms, and our license, bond and insurance certificates. Boards comparing bids need the same line items from every contractor to compare anything meaningfully, so we write our scopes to be read side by side.
If your board needs a walkthrough of the proposal at a meeting, we will attend.
What we work on — and what we don't
Being direct about this saves everyone a bid cycle.
We work on: asphalt shingle roofs, cement and concrete tile roofs, low-slope sections and transitions, flashing and roof-to-wall detail, skylights, gutters and gutter guards, attic and roof ventilation, and dry rot repair found during roof work.
We do not work on: metal roofing systems, cedar shake, or single-ply commercial membrane systems such as TPO, EPDM and PVC on primary flat roofs. If your property is a flat-roofed mid-rise, we are not the right contractor and we will tell you on the first call rather than on the third.
Most garden-style apartment and condo stock in this region is pitched shingle or tile, which is squarely what we do every day.
Multi-family roof services
Roof inspection and condition assessment
An on-roof inspection of every building, not a drive-by or a sample. You receive a written assessment with photos, remaining service life by building, and a prioritized recommendation.
Roof cleaning and moss treatment
Moss is the primary cause of premature roof failure in this climate, and large properties with mature tree canopy and north-facing slopes get hit hardest. We remove moss and debris without pressure washing, which strips granules and shortens roof life, then apply preventive treatment.
Targeted repair
Leak diagnosis, flashing repair, shingle and tile replacement, pipe boot and vent repair, and dry rot repair where water has already gotten in. Standalone repairs carry a 2-year workmanship warranty.
Phased and full replacement
Complete tear-off replacement — we do not install over existing roofing. Replacements carry a 14-year labor warranty.
Gutters, ventilation and skylights
Gutter cleaning and gutter guard installation, attic and roof ventilation correction, and skylight replacement using VELUX No Leak systems.
Why property managers choose an in-house crew
On a single-family home, a subcontracted crew is on site for two days. On a multi-family property, crews are on site for weeks, moving through a community where people live, walk their dogs and park their cars.
Every person on our crews is a W2 employee of Northwest Roof Maintenance, background-checked and in uniform. We do not subcontract labor. You get the same crew through the project, the same point of contact, and a company that carries its own workers’ comp rather than relying on a sub’s certificate.
For a board or a manager, that is the difference between managing a project and managing a rotating cast of strangers.
What multi-family roof work costs
Multi-family roofing is quoted per building, not as one property-wide number. Two buildings in the same complex, built the same year from the same plans, can price differently once you account for what’s around them and what’s underneath them. These are the factors that move the number.
Roof size, pitch and complexity
Square footage is the starting point, but shape matters as much. A simple gable runs faster and cheaper per square than a cut-up roofline with multiple hips, valleys and dormers. Steeper pitches require additional fall protection and slow production. Every penetration — plumbing vents, bath fans, dryer terminations, skylights — is a flashing detail that has to be built correctly, and garden-style buildings with many units have far more of them per square than a single-family home.
Access and staging
This is the factor most often underestimated on multi-family properties, and the one that varies most between buildings on the same site. A building with a drive-up elevation where a truck and dumpster can sit adjacent is straightforward. A building set behind a courtyard, fronted by mature landscaping, or reachable only across resident parking requires longer material carries, more hand-loading, and staging arrangements that consume crew hours before a single shingle is touched. Tight interior-court buildings in older complexes routinely cost more than identical buildings on the perimeter.
Existing roofing and tear-off
We do full tear-off only — we don’t install over existing roofing. Where a building carries more than one layer from a previous overlay, tear-off, disposal volume and dump fees all increase. Disposal costs also scale differently on a large property than a house, simply because of the tonnage involved.
Deck condition and dry rot
This is the one nobody can price accurately from the ground. Sheathing condition is unknown until the old roof comes off, and in this climate the damage tends to cluster in predictable places — valleys, wall intersections, around chimneys and under long-neglected moss. We quote deck repair at a unit rate and document what we find with photos, so the board sees why the number moved rather than receiving a change order with no explanation. On a phased project, what we find on the first building usually tells you what to expect across the rest.
Roof system and materials
Cement and concrete tile work differs from asphalt shingle in labor, handling and underlayment specification. Within shingles, the product line and its associated warranty affect material cost. We specify Malarkey as our primary manufacturer.
Current condition and how long it’s been deferred
A roof addressed while it’s still serviceable is a maintenance cost. The same roof five years later, after moss has held moisture against the granule surface through five wet seasons, is often a replacement — and if water has reached the sheathing, it’s a replacement plus structural repair. Deferral is the single largest multiplier on this list, and it’s the only one a board can control.
Phasing and sequencing
Staging replacement across budget years spreads the expense, but there’s a trade-off worth naming: mobilizing separately for each phase costs more in total than doing everything in one mobilization. Most properties still come out ahead phasing, because reserve funding and board approval cycles are the real constraint rather than raw cost. We’ll show you both so the decision is made with the numbers in front of you.
What you get instead of a number on this page: we walk every building, document condition with photos, and give you a written per-building scope and price. Boards comparing bids need identical line items from every contractor to compare anything meaningfully, so we write our scopes to be read side by side.
Apartment and Condo Roofing FAQ
Do you work on apartment complexes and condo buildings, or just houses?
Both. Northwest Roof Maintenance works pitched asphalt shingle and concrete tile roofs on apartment complexes, condominium communities, and townhome developments across the Portland and Vancouver metro — single buildings through multi-building properties. Larger properties are staged building by building rather than done all at once. We do not work on flat or low-slope systems.
Do you do flat or low-slope roofing?
Not as a primary system. We work pitched asphalt shingle and concrete tile, and we handle small low-slope sections — entry canopies, walkway covers, dormer transitions, small porch and balcony decks — using a granulated self-adhered system. That covers the low-slope details that show up on otherwise pitched multi-family buildings.
What we don’t take on is full low-slope roofs or large flat areas. If your property has substantial TPO, torch-down, or modified bitumen sections, you’ll need a low-slope contractor for those. We’ll tell you which category you’re in on the first call rather than after a site visit.
How do you handle a property too large to reroof in one year?
In stages, sequenced by condition. We inspect every building and give you a condition report broken out building by building, then build a phase plan from it. Buildings actively taking on water go first. Buildings with serviceable roofs get maintenance and move into later phases. That spreads cost across fiscal years and keeps disruption contained to one section of the property at a time.
Why does the tile on our condo community keep leaking when the tile looks fine?
Because the tile isn’t what waterproofs the roof — the underlayment beneath it is, and on most Portland-area communities that underlayment has reached the end of its life. Concrete tile routinely lasts fifty years. The felt, valley metal, and flashing under it were built to last about half that. Most tile-roofed condo and townhome developments in this metro went up in the 1980s and 90s, which puts them right at that point now. Sectional underlayment replacement keeps the existing tile on the roof and costs a fraction of a full tear-off.
Why does the tile on our condo community keep leaking when the tile looks fine?
Can you repair instead of replacing every roof on the property?
Usually, and at scale the savings compound. Buildings on the same complex were roofed at the same time but they don’t fail at the same rate — exposure, tree cover, and slope orientation produce a real range of conditions across one property. Most properties we inspect have a mix: a few buildings genuinely finished, several needing sectional repair, and some that need cleaning and nothing else.
Do you work with property managers, HOA boards, or owners directly?
All three. The documentation is built for it — photo condition reports broken out by building, so a manager can take it to a board and a board can take it to owners without translating anything first. Boards also use those reports for reserve planning.
Can you work around tenants and occupied units?
Yes, that’s the normal condition on this work. Staging building by building keeps activity contained to one section of the property, and we coordinate scheduling with management ahead of each phase so notices can go out on your timeline.
Do you subcontract crews on large properties?
No. Every job is done by our own W2 crews, and we have never subcontracted a roof since we started in 2004. On a phased project that may run two or three years, that means the same standards from the first building to the last rather than a rotating cast of subs.
What warranty comes with the work?
Set item 1 open on load. Two open items from earlier still stand: no cost question in the set, and question 7 assumes management handles tenant notices rather than you.
